I’m sorry that I can’t really recommend Terra Nova to diehard AOR fans anymore after listening to this.
Written by: gdmonline
ARTIST: Terra Nova
ALBUM: Ring That Bell
LABEL: Lion Music
SERIAL: LMC506
YEAR: 2022
CD REISSUE: Discogs Reissue List
COUNTRY OF ORIGIN: Netherlands
LINEUP: Fred Hendrix – vocals * Ron Hendrix – keyboards * Gesuino Derosas – guitars * Hans in ‘t Zandt – drums
Additional Musician: Eric Coenen – bass
TRACK LISTING: 01 Carpe Diem * 02 Crank It Up * 03 What’s Broken Can Be Mend * 04 Ring That Bell * 05 Home * 06 Angels & Demons * 07 Bust Your Balls * 08 Where Do We Go From Here * 09 Running On Empty * 10 Touch Down * 11 Gimme Shelter * 12 Second Chances * 13 We Are
RATING: 30/100
WEBLINKS: NA
Background
Terra Nova are a Dutch band that have been written about previously on this site going way back to the late 90’s. Early on in their career I really enjoyed their music, it was a pompy brand of AOR but over successive years my interest in them has waned. That’s because their songs have become monotonously boring, the drum work in particular has been really bad and uninteresting. They might as well have used a drum machine on some of their more recent releases. What is going on with these guys?
Because of this state of affairs, I have not listened to any Terra Nova music since 2015’s ‘Reinvent Yourself’ which (in my opinion) began their downward slide. The band was involved with another Dutch project called Two Of A Kind which was different due to the two female vocalists used and it wasn’t quite as dull as this.
The Songs
Where do we start? There are 13 songs, but I can assure you that I won’t be reviewing 13 songs in total, I’ll just cherry pick a few because I don’t think I can make it all the way through the album to be honest. There were only two songs that stuck with me and they were the title track ‘Ring That Bell’ and ‘Touch Down’, both tracks nudging into true hard rock territory. The rest? It was like listening to a very poor version of Grand Illusion due to Fred Hendrix sounding so much like Peter Sundell.
In Summary
The album was released by Lion Music, the Swedish label which I had thought had gone out of business so I was kinda surprised to see their name mentioned here. ‘Ring That Bell’ also saw a Japanese release. The album came out at the end of May 2022. I’m sorry that I can’t really recommend Terra Nova to diehard AOR fans anymore after listening to this, instead you should revisit their ‘Livin’ It Up’ and ‘Breakaway’ albums from the 90s for a better representation. Much much better.
