The Quill – Live, New, Borrowed, Blue

8/10

I always say that The Quill is Sweden’s Black Sabbath and as soon as “Keep On Moving” kicks in I still stand firmly in my opinion. I just love Magnus vocals and it is a voice that is instantly acknowledged. I was fortunate enough to see them as support act to Evergrey late last year and they kicked some serious butts then and there. Hopefully gained some new fans and followers.

If anyone were to play “S.O.S” for me in any other circumstance I would have asked them to skip the song. But the Aerosmith song is “Quillified” here and have a great groove.
Having the luxury or how to say it to scrap a song like “Children Of The Sun” off a record shows how high standard the band has. They almost come a bit close to doom metal on this one which shouldn’t be surprising but in a way it was and maybe that’s why it didn’t make the “Earthrise” album?

Now! “Where Eagles Dare” a classic hardrock track from a band everyone knows. Lets see if they hear comments like how cool of Maiden to do a cover of one of your songs (Wolf Hoffman once said that some fans came up to him and said that their cover of “Metal Heart” was very good) in the future? And a very good thing is that they didnt try to take on any of their bigger hits.

The live version of ”Keep It Together” brings chills to my arms and a throwback to the gig in Östhammar a few years back and of course the aforementioned gig in Stockholm. The band presents the song in a fantastic package.

I think it is a very kind gesture and a homage in a way to record the song “Mount Everest” from a band some people call the first hard rock band from Sweden – November.
Another song that missed the cut on ”Earthrise” were ”Burning Tree”. “A bluesy easy to nod your head to” song with Magnus singing through a megaphone!

The only song that weren’t a The Quill song I had heard before this album of course is the Iron Maiden song. But ”Frozen Over” got me interested in the band Captain beyond. And yes this album is all I think a history lesson of where The Quill take their inspirations from in a straight descending link. The songs are so Quillified (I like the word I just made up) that if the albums title didnt reveal them it would have almost gotten away with a NEW album.

The last track: The live version ”Hole In My Head” could easily have turned into one of those long jam sessions of a song that was popular in the 70s. A short song stretched into ten minutes and longer. Not that I mind. Its the Quill for gods sake. And baked into the song are a few lines from ”Fairies wear boots” which is nice and kind of obvious.