Recension 101 South - No U-Turn 2009

Tracks:
01. When You're In Love
02. All In The Game
03. Lonely Heart
04. What Are You Gonna Do Anyway
05. End Of The Game
06. From What You Know Now
07. Yesterday Is Gone
08. Take Me Home
09. Don't Tell Me It's Over
10. Blue Skies

Band:
Gregory Lynn Hall – vocals
Roger Scott Craig – keyboards/ vocals

Discography:
101 South (2000)
Roll of the Dice (2002)

Guests:
Chris Thompson - vocals on 'Blue Skies'
Guitars: Billy Liesegang, Ian Bairnson and David Pasillas
Bass: Jimmy Turner
Drums: Hans Geiger
Sax solo on 'Blue Skies' - Alan Kroll, Aka 'The Sax Therapist'

Info:

Released: 20/11-2009
Reviewed: 3/2-2010

Links:
101south.com
myspace
metalheaven

One out of twenty people are now willing to pay me for my music. The rest think it is okay to go get my creative work for free using an Illegal site in some foreign land and they obviously think that I do not need or deserve any revenues from this music!! Just for the record I will make NO MONEY on this new 101 South CD called 'No U Turn' rather it has cost me $10,000 more than I will ever earn in order to provide you the fans with my music. Apart from Illegal downloading we also have 'bootlegs' of our music being distributed in so many countries for which artists receive nothing.
Plus so many people burn copies of CDs for their friends and family and from some reports for every one CD sold, ten copies are burned and again no revenues go to the artists. How unfair is this? When you think that 97% of all CDs make no money at all and with only a 3% success rate you would think that people would have some sympathy for musicians but obviously not! 19 out of people now walk into our ice cream store, enjoy the ice cream then leave without paying us for the ice cream!
How do we run a business using this business model? The 101 South CDs are in transit and will soon be shipped out to the fans, signed by myself and by 101 South vocalist Gregory Lynn Hall. Sadly this involves four separate shipments which takes considerable time. For those who no longer want these signed CDs FULL REFUNDS will be going out this week. Then I will be heading down to McDonalds to get a job so I can pay my electric bill!! And my house is going into Foreclosure!! Oh well, just hope those 19 out of 20 people are enjoying my music today! This is what keyboardist Roger Scott Craig writes at the band’s website and if any of this is true it is rather tragic that so many people are willing to steal something someone has worked very hard and spent loads of money to create. I guess that is the main reason for the decline in quality of music over the last decade, it is your fault, you who think the musicians’ work is worth nothing.

I don’t know if that is why this record feels more or less like déjà vu as I feel like it is Foreigner without inspiration and without new ideas. Not that 101 South makes poor music but they make music that have been done many times before and many times before it has been made better than this. I think the songs on this record are rather good, at the very least rather decent and want to like this record but every time it ends I forget it.

Musically we have melodic rock or what is called AOR by many. Bands like Toto, Foreigner, TNT, Soul Doctor, Time Elevation, 707, Boston, Harlan Cage and so on can be said to be similar, one could almost sometimes believe this record was made by either of these bands. There is nothing unique at all when it comes to the music of this kind.

I kind of like the opening track When You’re in Love which is a very good track and really the only memorable to come out of this record. Other than this track which is the featured video of this review, it is nothing that I can remember when the last track fades out and the record ends.

I get the feeling that 101 South makes music that is supposed to be played in elevators or while someone waits on hold on the phone. It is music that feels made to be played in the background and for that it is excellent.

HHHHHHH