THE VISITATION

Magnum has been hanging around for decades. Four decades, I have heard. They were really big, even cool, at the last end of the 1980s just before Nirvana blew the hair metal scene away with Nevermind. I was very much into this scene. But strangely enough, Visitation is the first Magnum album I have ever owned. I have never ever heard a tone by this band before I put this album on to do this review. I am in other words a newbie to their world.

Magnum does a blend of 1980s hair/heavy metal, pub rock, neo prog and AOR. Middle of the road (MOR) rock it was called back in those days. That is what Magnum is doing. There is even some football terraces choirs on this album. A not so good reminder about the good old days. Bob Catley's vocals are great though and this veteran is still going strong. He is the best thing about Magnum by a long stretch. The quality of the songs are good and I am steadily getting more and more into this album. But I would not call this an exciting album by any means. It is middle of the road rock music and that is all there is about it. I cannot fault it, but I cannot really work up some enthusiasm about it either.

Good, but nothing more. And I am not converted into buying any more Magnum albums.

3 stars