Thin Lizzy - Jailbreak
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Free Music Notes for Jailbreak
Free Music Review: Thin Lizzy's maturation
Hit: 5 Stars
I have to admit I didn't like Thin Lizzy at first, beyond The Boys Are Back In town. When I first bought this in 1989 I was heavily into a Black Sabbath phase, and somwehow Thin Lizzy didn't sit quite right with me. I didn't like the slow songs, I disliked the funky elements (here typified by Angel From The Coast) and they seemed too down to earth for my taste.
How things have changed! Twenty years later I mainly listen to classcial but Thin Lizzy are one of only a handful or rock bands I still listen to. Now, I can really appreciate this band. They had so much; songs with melody yet attitude, great musicianship, and if I may use a quote beloved of pretentious music critics, "resonance". Incredibly though it took 6 albums in as many years for Thin Lizzy to gain widespread acclaim, although with Jailbreak it's easy to understand why the public finally realised how good this band was. The songs are all finely crafted, catchy and the famous (and influential) twin guitar style was perfected here after some experimental attempts. The main attraction to Jailbreak is of course the song The Boys Are Back In Town, very nearly the perfect all out rock and roll song, neatly combining melancholy touches in the verse to the triumphant, rousing chrous.
I might point out too that I've come to appreciate Lizzy as musicians too. Of course Scott Gorham and Brian Roberstson are the easiest to spot here, but Brian Downey is a drummer that should get wider acclaim. He's never overpowering in the way that some rock drummers are but complements the songs with an almost perfect beat and cymbal technique. He's not trying to outshine the others, he know his job is to provide a solid base for the others to build on. Listen to Angel From The Coast for an example. Above all though I've come to regard Phil Lynott's voice as one if the best in rock. He sings somewhat like Freddie Mercury, sharp, not flat, and there are vocal harmony overdubs that sound not dissimilar to some Queen.
Overall if you want hard rock that isn't ashamed to be melodic then Thin Lizzy are a band you should like. Perhaps the best analogy I can make is to Queen. They share a similar ratio of rockers to slow songs, they use melodic yet aggressive guitar and use similar vocal techniques. Thin Lizzy are much more streetwise and earthy than the (intentional) theatrics of Queen though. (As an aside Thin Lizzy toured with Queen in 1977, what a show that must have been!)
Maybe the only problem I have with Jailbreak as an album is that it seems to outshine any other Thin LIzzy release in popularity. Ask the average rock fan about Thin Lizzy and they'll name The Boys Are Back In Town. Some might be able to tell you that it's from Jailbreak and mention either the title track or maybe Emerald. For 90% of rock fans though, the rest of Thin Lizzy's catalog is a mystery. Which is a shame as they did so many good songs both previously and after their breakthrough with Jailbreak, and this album is just one aspect of their multi faceted career. Although this album, as a whole, is clearly one of Thin Lizzy's high points, it is not the bands only great moment. If you want to experience Thin Lizzy though, then Jailbreak is the ideal start point.
Free Music Review: One Of The Great Mysteries
Hit: 5 Stars
Pop music is a very bizarre adjudicator. A band like Boston sells millions by pumping out a manufactured "hard rock" sound, bands like Journey, Styx and Foreigner sell millions playing non-descript, bland character-less pap, and Jim Morrison inexplicably gets called a poet. Meanwhile, a band of brilliant musicians, which played with flair and passion, led by a true poet who wore his heart on his sleeve, Phil Lynott, gets cast into the ignominy of music dustbins. Thin Lizzy was a hard rock band, and their presence loomed large over British hard rock in the '70's. Lynott was your proto-typical glib Irishman and their influence reached everyone from the NWOBHM bands - especially Maiden and Leppard, to Metallica to the likes of U2 (Bono cribbed his share of note from the Lynott playbook), and early punk and new wave. (Midge Ure, later of Ultravox, played on "Black Rose", while Lynott joined Paul Cook and Steve Jones in a one-off band called the Greedies, not to mention the likes of the Boomtown Rats.) Heck, Wilco even covered "Cowboy Song". "Jailbreak" is Thin Lizzy's finest moment. First of all, unlike most hard rock bands of their era and ilk, Lizzy could groove. Armed with a great rhythm section propelled by one of the all-time under-rated drummer, Brian Downey, Lizzy actually fell in the cracks between the hard funk of the likes of Funkadelic and the boogie of a bands like ZZ Top. One of the reasons given for Lizzy's failure to conquer the rock is that they were too while for black audiences, and too black for white rock audience. However, just give a listen to "Angel From The Coast", a riff that Price nicked for "Baby I'm A Star". There's plenty of sonic crunch - the title track, "Warrior" and Emrald all kick major butt. However, Lizzy could slip into an easy groove on "Running Back", while, Lynott spreads his Van Morrison influences all over the place on "Romeo And The Lonely Girl". And, Lynott could always turn a phrase with charisma, as in the gentle plea for racial harmony in "Fight Or Fall". And, of course, there's one of the greatest songs ever written, "The Boys Are Back In Town", a song that distills all of Lynott's Springsteen influence into a tidy "back with my crew and life's good" sentiment. "Won't be long 'til summer comes, now that the boys are here again", indeed!Free Music Review: The breakout album from the band
Hit: 5 Stars
This album was the first time I had heard of the band "Thin Lizzy", (I was 13 at the time. It was our nation's bicentennial!). It was also the album that made me want to learn guitar as a kid, and I knew exactly how I wanted to sound. LIKE THESE GUYS!!!!To me the look and sound of Thin Lizzy was the coolest. I never felt cheated with any of their STUDIO albums (even "Renegade" had some great moments on it), and I admire their courage to record songs that made Thin Lizzy a truly "singular" band.
But not everyone was so taken with this band. Critically they were often slammed. Read what Robert Christgau wrote about Thin Lizzy, and the album "Jailbreak"....... (from Robert Christgau, Christgau's Record Guide, 1981)....
>>>The proof of how desperate people are for new Springsteen is that they'll settle for this -- even "The Boys Are Back in Town" is the sort of thing that ends up in Bruce's wastebasket. If Irish teen traumas are as boring as Phil Lynott's descriptions of them, it's no wonder they have trouble maintaining their birthrate. And if Irish teen traumas are as secondhand as Scott Gorham's guitar lines, the Irish will probably end up preferring Springsteen too. B- <<<<<
I'm glad Thin Lizzy sound didn't compare to the bombast of "everyman" and critical darling, Bruce Springsteen. And I'm glad that the band kept doing what IT wanted to musically, critics be damned. Thin Lizzy's guitar work when Scott and Brian played together was brilliant, the song styles and subject matter varied, the song writing was at times subpar (being honest here), but usually excellent. They were never boring. There sound was exciting, and at times different and very challenging, unlike Springsteen (why people tried to compare the two is beyond me).
When Thin Lizzy released these 4 studio albums consecutively....Jailbreak (1976) Johnny the Fox (1976) Bad Reputation (1977) Black Rose (1979)....it was rock nirvana for me. I can't think of another band that influenced me in my youth the way these guys did, and I thank them for it. I would have given anything to play guitar like Scott and Brian, and be as cool as Phil.
Free Music Review: Highly influential album of its time
Hit: 5 Stars
The most sucessful studio album by Thin Lizzy.
Some points on Thin Lizzy
As a band it takes some listening to the band to get into them mainly due to the Weird style of singing by Phil and the rhymes which at times seem out of tune.
In fact once you get into the band the thing that were tough to digest infact are the endearing parts of the bands unique music.
Nearly all early albums of the band have a heady mix of hard riff based rockers and beautiful barritone love ballads (with the sweetest of lyrics).
The Band consists of :
Phil Lynot on Vocals / Bass Leader
Grahom Scott and Brian Robertson on Guitar
Brain Downey on Drums
The Peak of the band starts from 'Jailbreak' in '75/'76 and continues to 'Black Rose' in '80 their 4th release. after 'Jailbreak'
On Jailbreak
This is my favorite album as it contains two great rockers in the title song and 'The boys are back in town' both hard rockers with great guitar work duels between Groham and Robertson.
The mellower ' Angel from the coast' and 'Worrior' are also great.
My favorites on the album are the ballads 'Romeo and the lonely girl' and the amazing 'Fight or Fall' both these numbers showcase the ability of Phil to compose and write soft songs and give a kind feeling to the vocals that somehow make these songs immortal.
Another famous song by the band is 'Cowboy song' which has influenced the basis of the band 'Bon Jovi. Metallica is another band influenced by Lizzy though the music styles between the two is very different.
It is sad that great Bands like 'Lizzy', 'Uriah Heep' are fading from the memory of the current generation of rock listeners as they are as good in their own way to the bigger bands of their generation like 'Led Zepppelin, Black Sabbath, Deep Purple and Pink floyd'.
Free Music Review: Down from the glen came the marching men...
Hit: 5 Stars
So begins a hard rock piece de resistance "Emerald" yet another fantastic song written by Philip Lynott about his homeland. As the closer to Lizzy's landmark sixth LP, 'Jailbreak' (released in March 1976), "Emerald" incapsulates much if the power of one of rock's greatest bands. The guitar duel by Brian Roberston and Scott Gorham is amazing! As a follow to 'Fighting', 'Jailbreak' continued the winning streak and has generally been regarded as Thin Lizzy's most consistent record. It was by far their biggest hit, unquestionably driven home by "The Boys Are Back in Town", their most famous song. One slightly overplayed classic aside, this album also contains fan favorites such as the title track and "Cowboy Song", especially powerful on the subsequent live record ("Jailbreak" being the kickass opener then "Emerald" with "Boys" leading into "Cowboy Song" and it sends chills!). Some of the lesser known songs such as "Angel from the Coast" (just listen to the guitar interplay as the song begins..flawless), "Romeo and the Lonely Girl" (typical Lynott sad song, but beefed up by another classic lead break!)and "Warriors" make this a must buy for the budding Lizzy enthusiast. While I don't know if 'Jailbreak' is a true concept album, songs such as "Jailbreak" and "Boys" seemed to refer to the same characters if played in that sequence. I wish to God rock radio would play more from this record, or just more from Lizzy in general. as only "Boys" or "Jailbreak" seem to matter to them. These quibbles aside, Thin Lizzy was thrust into the first division after five years and six albums, if only US success could have lasted then they would be rightly regarded as rock royalty. Roll me over and turn me around...Breakout...coming to claim the Emerald!