LANDLORDS OF ATLANTIS

If your a Jazz/Fusion band and are going to have the nerve to call yourself the FIRE MERCHANTS you better be able to back that up. Well having John Goodsall on guitar is a great start, and the former BRAND X guitarist or should I say flame-thrower is all over this. But not so fast though because that debut from 1989 with Chester Thompson on drums is panned by a lot of reviewers including myself. It's good but lacking in many ways. I'm so glad they decided to do one more record, this time without Chester as Toss Panos(an alias?) replaces him, while the third member of the trio Doug Lunn continues from the debut playing bass but also adding piano on two tracks. By the way Doug composed five of the nine tracks here while John did the other four.

Released in 1994 we get an hour of instrumental music and the opener, that title track might be the best. The sounds of water and seagulls, then all of a sudden it sounds like we're listening in on an army drill before John lets loose. "lifetimes" is the other standout track where we get a catchy but heavy sound. I actually briefly thought of RUSH a minute in, but it's brief. Lots of fire on this album but they do mix it up with some jazz stuff and John uses synth-guitar at times. Even a mellow tune like "Healing Dream" sounds legit with the fast paced intricate guitar and synth guitar too. Okay it's not that mellow, just compared to the rest. "Thing 15" is an example of a jazzy tune.

This is maybe the heaviest album you will hear Goodsall on, and I need to mention Kevin Gilbert who produced, engineered and mixed this record for about the cost of a cup of coffee, as it says in the liner notes.

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