Having wowed audiences across the country during their co-headline tour with Collateral, and having consolidated their position with dates supporting the mighty Glenn Hughes, Piston are well-placed to release their long-awaited debut album. Self-released (albeit with distribution from Music Glue), the eponymous effort features ten tracks of fat-free rock ‘n’ roll and the band have done a good job of capturing the energy that they bring to the stage.
Any band brave enough to open with a track entitled Dynamite needs to have the chops to carry it off, but fortunately (as fans who caught the live shows can attest), Piston are right on the money and the track is aptly named. Keeping the pace fast, the band unleash Rainmaker, with little space for the listener to draw breath. Heavily rooted in the band’s much-loved AC/DC, it offers up a stripped-down verse that gives the vocals a chance to shine before the gritty, bluesy riff comes swopping in for the sing-along chorus. A touch more sedate, the groovy Go Now has a Black Crowes melody and a desire to “party like it’s ‘89”, the band once again showing their mastery of the pithy chorus. Having opened up the album in a blaze of heavy riffing, the band maintain the Black Crowes comparison (with more than a touch of Creedance thrown in for good measure) on the acoustic Carry Us Home, a reflective moment amidst all the bombast, that has the potential to stop the show nicely. It builds nicely too, gaining a gritty solo and a soaring climax over the course of just four short minutes. The first half of the album comes to a storming end with the all-guns-blazing rock ‘n’ roll of One More Day, a taut, anthemic track that sounds like the soundtrack to every beer-fuelled road trip on which you’ve ever been.
Opening the second side with Mutt Lange-esque drums and a gnarled riff, Beyond Repair is a stormer, with tough palm-muted riffs and manic vocals getting under the skin just in time for the killer chorus to finish the job of embedding the track within the listener’s consciousness. As a rule I’m a sucker for any track that pulls off the trick of pairing long, drawn-out chords and a countrified riff in the vein of Zakk Wylde’s Pride and Glory, and Leave If You Dare does it well, emerging as an album highlight in the process. After the hazy Southern rock of Leave If You Dare, it’s back to rocking the socks off the audience with the stop-start riff of Blow it Away, all hulking riffs and crash-washed percussive might. The instantly relatable Let Us Rise takes a lyrical cue from Monster Magnet, labelling work as overrated before encouraging the audience to break out of society’s norms over a frantic, funky blues riff. It leaves Into The Night to round out this immensely satisfying collection on a high note, the band indulging in one of the album’s heaviest riffs just as they’re swaggering out of the door. Another live killer they’ve followed the rock 101 tenet of always leaving the audience wanting more, and then they’re gone, leaving only puddles of beer and exhausted bodies in their wake.
Piston are clearly students of the School Of Rock, and they have learned their lessons well, drawing on myriad influences to pull together this collection of rock anthems that sound familiar without descending into pastiche. Well played and produced, there’s a clear ambition here that suggests the band revere the arena-crushing days of Mutt Lange-era AC/DC and they come damn near to pulling it off on a fraction of the unholy budget that resulted in those albums. Loud, proud and with nearly every track memorable, relatable and full of sing-along moments, this self-titled effort is one hell of a sparkling debut. 9/10
Check out the band (and buy the CD) here:
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