Gotthard must be one of the most popular and successful bands ever in Switzerland, having received a diamond award for sales of more than a million albums (in a country of just seven million) and having eleven consecutive number one albums. All this from a band that I had never heard of until these two albums were made available at a cheap price as part of the ‘Classic Series’ from Nuclear Blast. ‘Lip Service’ is from 2005, while ‘Domino Effect’ is from 2007, yet if you heard this without knowing the year or the country of origin you would swear that this was late Eighties American melodic hard rock. These guys have taken Bon Jovi as their model, brought in elements of Journey and Bad English, and produced music that is corporate stadium rock, played with loads of melody and hooks.
I’m amazed that I had never come across these guys before this, as this is pure fun from start to end. This isn’t music that you should think about, this is music to make the listener smile and want to jump and down and have a great time. Singer Steve Lee is a star, with a Steve Tyler type sneer at times, but way more melodic, while the rest of the band provide the perfect backdrop. Thirty-one songs on this double CD set, and it is hard to fault any of them, as each and every one could be lifted as a single. There is nearly two hours of music on show, and if you love melodic hard rock then this is an essential purchase – it is as if grunge never happened, and all the forms of down-tuned extreme metal are just a nightmare.
