SHADES OF GRAY – 2021 (Album Review)

SHADES OF GRAY – 2021 (Album Review)
SHADES OF GRAY – 2021

Shades of Gray is the new project by Myke Gray (Skin, Jagged Edge, UFO and Red White & Blues). Myke wrote all of the songs, plays all the guitars and does the singing and he also produced the album. Paul Newdeck (Midnite City, Eden’s Curse) plays drums and co-produced and it was mastered by Andy Sneap.

The album is a great collection of songs, with a classic rock meets glam feel. Shades of Gray is about Myke’s love of glam rock from the ’70s, ’80s and ’90s influenced by bands like Sweet, Motley Crue, Alice Cooper, Kiss.

This was the first I have heard of Myke Gray. I stumbled onto a video he released for the song “I Get Up” and that led me to search out what else he had done. So I did what I normally do and I went to Spotify to see if I can hear more from him. I found an album by him called Shades of Gray but it was released in 2017 and it was instrumental. It was not the release that I was looking for but wow what a great guitar player. So I did more digging and saw a few more videos and liked them all.

I saw an interview with him and he was mentioning how he feels about the record industry and how the artists don’t really make much from the releases due to the record company and streaming services not paying the artists what they truly deserve, so he decided to only release it via his website. So off to the website I went and purchased the digital download of the album. The email with the download took a while to get to me about an hour or so, along with that was another email from Myke apologizing that the email was delayed he was on a plane and wasn’t able to get it to me earlier. That experience and the great album that he has released made me a fan of not just the music but the man himself. You can tell he loves what he does and puts everything into it.

On to the songs:

This is one hell of a fun album. Great to crank up and play during the summer parties. Not a bad track on this album.

The album starts off with “Turn it up Louder” with Myke singing to turn it up louder and then goes into a nice guitar riff. The chorus will have you singing along by the end of the song.

“This is how we rock and roll” and “Music is My Remedy” are almost like it’s his story. In that interview I mentioned earlier he goes on about how at the age of 13 Bernie Torme got him up on the stage to play with him. Later he played with UFO at age 18.

“I Get Up” is the first song I heard from this release and it has that early ’80s Poison feel. The videos he did for these songs are great as well. All of the performers are actually Myke.

Are You Ready For Love”, “Shout”, “Tied Up in Love” have that 90’s glam-rock feel. The guitar work on those songs is also fantastic.

“Wham Bam” has a ’70s Sweet, T-Rex vibe.

“Take me Higher” is a hard-edged melodic rock track that has another great guitar solo and album closer “California” is a power-pop track that closes off this great fun album.

Final thoughts:

I am so glad that I found out about Myke Gray, This album is such a fun release that I will be playing it all summer long. I don’t skip any of the tracks I like them all. Please go and watch the videos that he has released so far, they are fun as well. I even looked back at some of his stuff that he did with Skin and that sounded great as well, I guarantee I will be tracking down some of their stuff.

Well done Myke.

Also, find more of my CGCM reviews here: Ivan Galesic

Ivan Galesic

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2021 album tracklist:

01 Turn It Up Louder
02 This Is How We Rock And Roll
03 I Get Up
04  Are You Ready For Love
05 Shout
06 Wham Bam
07 Tied Up In Love
08 Music Is My Remedy
09 Take Me Higher
10 California

[embedyt] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nf1oF-T9NM4[/embedyt]

 

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[embedyt] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VlNv9BHAuwo[/embedyt]

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