Majors & Minors

While I don’t want to make a habit out of reviewing compilation albums, ‘Majors & Minors’ was exactly the album I was hoping Tygers Of Pan Tang would release for a couple of years now. Ever since their current singer Jacopo Meille joined the band, I feel like their sound has been improving significantly. His Michael Hutchence meets Robert Plant voice gave the band a somewhat more melodic edge and apparently a great deal of inspiration. Stylistically, the band still plays their blend of hard rock and early heavy metal, with the riffs leaning more towards the latter and the melodies more towards the former.

All Meille-fronted albums by the band suffer a similar flaw, however, and that is the fact that the band tends to get stuck in the same mid-tempo gear for longer than necessary. ‘Majors & Minors’ does what many compilation albums fail to do: it truly focuses on the band’s strongest moments from the era presented here. There is still quite a bit of mid-tempo material, as that is what Tygers Of Pan Tang has been doing most frequently even in their early eighties heyday, but since quite a few of the better tracks of the last couple of studio albums are the faster ones, the dynamics simply work much better here.

Sequencing is a big factor in that and whoever was in charge of that for ‘Majors & Minors’ did a great job. All of the band’s recent albums had fantastic opening tracks, but a compilation can have only one. And while the passionate, very well-structured ‘Keeping Me Alive’ is my favorite of the bunch, the energetic, yet extremely catchy ‘Only The Brave’ is definitely the right choice to kick off this compilation. The partial ‘Hellbound’-rewrite ‘Never Give In’ is another fast rocker that may not have been an opening track, but has gotten a prominent place on ‘Majors & Minors’.

Interestingly enough, some of the mid-tempo tracks come across a little better here due to their placement. ‘White Lines’ was not one of my favorite tracks of their most recent studio album ‘Ritual’, but works extremely well here. ‘She’ kind of went by unnoticed every time I listened to ‘Ambush’, but its placement on ‘Majors & Minors’ made me realize that it is quite a cool track with a really cool, yearning feel. There will always be song choices to disagree with on a one-disc compilation – personally, I could have done without the sleazy, but just not groovy enough ‘Glad Rags’, though I understand its inclusion – but that remains a matter of taste.

There is not that much in terms of previously unreleased material on ‘Majors & Minors’. The orchestral mix of ‘Spoils Of War’ is not different enough from the original to pull out your wallet, but I do have to admit the excellent B-side ‘What You Say’ is better than a significant number of tracks that did make it to Tygers Of Pan Tang’s recent albums. As a result, hardcore fans might find ‘Majors & Minors’ a disappointing release, though the liner notes are fairly interesting. But as an introdcution to what Tygers Of Pan Tang has been doing over the last decade or so, it is a perfect release. One I have been craving ever since loving a few tracks on the last couple of albums; most of them are gathered hear for everone to hear.

Recommended tracks: ‘Keeping Me Alive’, ‘Only The Brave’, ‘What You Say’

Originally written for my Kevy Metal weblog

"Okay, welcome to our first lesson in heavy metal history today. Who knows about animals in heavy metal band names? You over there sitting on the left?"
"Heavysaurus?"
"Em, yes, okay but first a "saurus" isn't an animal and second the dinosaurs are extinct. Another try, come on – yes you here in front of me, please."
"Airwolf?"
"Yes, this is a very good answer, but we don't deal neither with the German band nor with the helicopter. Maybe another one would like to try? You there who is permanently tilting with his chair!"
"Scorpions!"
"Yes, quite a good answer but I'm looking for a band which is alive"
"But sir, the Scorpions ARE still alive!"
"Really? I think that they are dead for about 25 years now but still didn't recognize it. Okay, I will give you a hint. The band has four letters in its name and one word is written wrong. Nobody? Okay, another hint – the name is taken from a story by Michael Moorcock."
"Sir, I know it!!! It's Tygers Of Pan Tang!! But they are not active anymore!!"
"Please raise your hands instead of shouting your answer!! But you are completely right with the name. Only the fact that they split-up isn't correct, they are still alive!!! So it seems that you learnt something new today, now I will tell you some more about it!"

Well, actually this would be a terrible lesson with me as a teacher, but fact is (and I somehow didn't notice it until I got the promo) that Tygers Of Pan Tang are still alive and currently have released a compilation of songs from their last four albums called Majors & Minors. This is not only intended to be a 'best of' from these albums but also some tracks which aren't played too often on their concerts and didn't came out as singles. What we can listen to on this compilation is some very fine hard rock / heavy metal with catchy melodies and excellent songwriting. Of course, these tracks don't have much to do with the old Tygers Of Pan Tang back in the 80s but they still know how to grip the listener.

Concerning the musicians on this compilation, the only constant are guitarist (and only founding member remaining) Robb Weir and vocalist Jacopo Meille, whose debut for Tygers Of Pan Tang was on the first of the represented albums on this compilation (Animal Instinct). One could say that the compilation is also a representative cross-section of his work in the band.

'Only The Brave' is a classic heavy metal stomper with a very cool guitar solo in the middle part and I guess it's a good track to start with. 'She' starts with a very groovy Kiss riff ('Lick it Up') only a little bit faster and its kept in the mid-paced tempo. The track spreads the atmosphere of some rock bands of the 80s. 'Never Give In' is one of the fastest songs of the album and convinces through a dramatic riffing, great chorus and a very melodic bridge part. Maybe 'Painkiller' would be a fitting reference to this track. 'Worlds Apart' is one of my favorites of the album. Very melodic and heavy, quite an epic hymn with great guitar work (I still cannot stop name dropping – that somehow reminds me of the first Hammerfall album). 'Glad Rags' is another trip into the early 80s when bands like Mötley Crue or Bon Jovi were starting their career. Take your hair spray and put your stretch jeans on!!!

I guess it is quite boring if I would go too much into detail with every track so let me sum up that Majors & Minors is a very successful compilation of some tracks from last four albums. The tracks present some classic hard rock and heavy metal music without any experiments or modern touch so it should be worth listening to for everybody who likes some traditional metal music. I think there are no failures on this release and I had fun listening to the tracks. It is like some kind of easy listening, and you can listen to it while you play sports or when you drive your car as well. If you maybe have lost sight of Tygers Of Pan Tang in the last couple of years or you didn't know about them, this is a pretty good way to check if you (still) like them. Check the release, it is worth listening to and if you like the tracks, maybe you get interested in the band (again)!!

Rating: 8 out of 10 roars

Review originally written for metalbite.com