High Spirits – You Are Here (Hells Headbangers)

High Spirits – You Are Here (Hells Headbangers)

Chris Black released two new albums in 2014: Dawnbringer’s Night Of The Hammer and High Spirits’ You Are Here. Night Of The Hammer was a really good record that I couldn’t lock into, for some reason, but You Are Here was a total goddamn blast that I couldn’t get enough of. High Spirits are Black’s feelgood metal band, the one that would have scored a drag-race scene in a slob comedy circa 1983. Here Black, finds his influence at the exact point before feelgood metal became a joke, before Poison and Warrant ruined it for everyone, when bands like Kix and Ratt were considered (and in fact were) every bit as unassailably great as Judas Priest and AC/DC. And every detail on You Are Here is spot on: the thin instrumental tones, the simple yet timeless song structures, the high-pitched melodic vocal attack. But while Black is an obsessive historian and sonic perfectionist, he’s also a hell of a songwriter: His songs are focused, engaging, and insanely catchy. You Are Here may be of another era, but it sounded great in 2014. [LISTEN]