Reckless Love – Turborider – Album Review

Returning with their first album in six years, Reckless Love bring their obvious love of 80s hair metal firmly into the 21st Century. A mix of reminiscence, within a very modern sounding production, creating a rather curious beast of an album in the process. You could almost describe it as nostalgia from the future. 

Bands have been described as pop rock for many years. Generally, this was a rock band, say Cheap Trick, integrating pop harmonies into the hard rock world to soften it down and broaden their appeal. Rock band first, the pop element was secondary. Here Reckless Love add so much pop to the mix, that in a lot of places, the opposite could be said to be the case. It sounds like pop band experimenting with a new rocky sound. I could say boy band, but that would be a tad harsh.

On previous albums, such as 2016’s InVader, a hard rock sound was subtly augmented by synth beats. On Turborider, they have been pushed much higher in the mix, at the expense of the rest of the instrumentation. The biggest casualty of this approach has been the drums, which sound soul-less and programmed throughout. A track like Eyes Of A Maniac shows off this approach, indeed the musical template for much of the album, very well. A synth based pop verse, before guitars kick in for the chorus. 

That said, the album does have it’s moments where the rock band defeats the machine. The title track boasts a meaty riff, even if it does also follow that aforementioned song formula. I can imagine it being a good song live, where these songs should in theory sound like very different beasts. This album is so polished, it makes Def Leppard‘s pristine Hysteria sound like it was knocked out in a day. The clinical sound. whilst probably technically perfect, does , however, sit largely at odds with the songs. It really lacks a bit of grit and punch to my ears. More than a bit in fact.

In spite of my feelings about the production, they clearly have the knack of writing hooky, catchy songs. For example Outrun really would certainly get an A plus from the teacher at songwriting school. It’s easily the best original song on offer here. LIkewise with a lot of the album, it’s almost a visual track, You almost feel like you’re trapped in Tron or a similar world, trying to escape, or Rocky Balboa doing yet another driving montage. But it just feels like it deserved a more meaty production treatment.

The juxtaposition of hard rock and synth beats gets it’s most jarring outing on a cover of Ozzy‘s Bark At The Moon. It’s a faithful enough cover..if you ignore the synth beats underpinning it. I’ve listened to it several times, and one one hand it works, bringing a modern edge to a now 40 year old track. In contrast on other listens, I hate it. A real marmite moment, much like comparing real life old school Ozzy, with the modern day Sharon created caricature that he’s morphed into these days.

The album is largely very pleasant, though there isn’t much that memorable about the second half of it’s tracklisting. However, the track that really jars with me most is ’89 Sparkle. It just sounds like a boy band trying to gain airplay on Radio 2. Just awful. In reality, that radio appeal may be the crux of the matter here. The whole album feels like it’s aimed at the pop mainstream as equally as the rock market. Whilst there’s no doubting it would easily be at home with the majority of chart acts in such an environment, it also runs the risk of being as disposable and quickly forgotten as them too. 

I’ve always been a sucker for pop sensibilities and melodies in hard rock music, but this album takes it too far the that way. Rock melodies and sensibilities in pop music, which is a shame. A better balance of the two would have improved things immensely. 

Score: 4/10

Tracklisting:

1 – Turborider 

2 – Eyes Of A Maniac

3 – Outrun

4 – Kids Of The Arcade

5 – Bark At The Moon

6 – Prelude (Flight Of The Cobra)

7 – Like A Cobra

8 – For The Love Of Good Times

9 – ’89 Sparkle

10 – Future Lover Boy

11 – Prodigal Sons

Release Date: March 25th 2022

Label: AFM

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