THIN LIZZY: Black Rose (HARD ROCK): review / opinion to read on Music Waves

After the huge live album Live And Dangerous, Thin Lizzy could not but have been awaited at the crossroads, especially since Robertson, a distinguished guitarist, had left the ship. Phil Lynott's men, who were quite successful in Europe at the time, had also given themselves another challenge, that of getting a breakthrough across the Atlantic. So it was with a heavy burden on their shoulders that the Irish band released Black Rose in 1979.

We might as well say it straight away, the success was mitigated. The album was highly rated by English fans (2nd place in the charts), but it was a complete flop in the States and the tour that followed was also a flop, partly due to Lynott whose various excesses wearied Gary Moore who left the band right in the middle of it. That's right, Moore the enfant terrible, who had joined the band for the recording of this album and who had already dragged his six-string with the band for a few months in 1974 and from the winter of 1976 to the summer of 1977 when it was a question of replacing Brian Robertson who had been fired by Lynott after a hand injury one night while drinking.

We start with Do Anything You Want To. Here we find the melodious guitars, an Irish inspiration, tribal drums and a catchy melody. Simplicity and efficiency are the key words of this famous opening track, followed by Toughest Street In Town, which cleverly places warm and catchy backing vocals around its classic framework. This track is perhaps the weakest on the record.

Let's move on to S & M, whose unusual rhythmic pattern can be surprising, as well as Lynott's voice, which is at times high-pitched and carried by unusual female choruses, which at times sound like evocative screams. Judiciously wedged behind this musical surprise, the unavoidable Waiting For An Alibi, a federating hit which accompanied the end of the band's career on stage and which has an unbeatable melody, is followed by Sarah, a very beautiful ballad which will be a notable success. The acoustic guitar knows how to be entrancing to tell us this story where the father/daughter relationship is evoked simply but cleverly.

Save Got To Give It Up for the end, carried by Lynott's deep and sensual voice with its thrilling solos and shivering break, and of course Black Rose, a real musical cataclysm, certainly one of the ten best hard rock songs of all time. Seven Dantesque minutes thrown on a fantastic Irish melody background, dishevelled guitar dialogues striking enchanting notes and a possessed end pouring a breathtaking melodic maelstrom.

What else can be said about this great record, except that one feels a certain maturity in the writing and the birth of a more significant depth in the approach of the lyrics. Phil Lynott begins to open up. "Black Rose" is a must in the underrated Thin Lizzy discography and reminds us how incredible a frontman Phil Lynott was. - Official website

THIN LIZZY

BLACK ROSE

VERTIGO

HARD ROCK