|The MP3 Songs|Nikammusic Productions|Rock Cafe|Music Mayer|

Nikammusic Productions  

BOBBY MILFORD - THE MP3 SONGS

INDEPENDENT 

Combining influences from many 80's acts such as Marillion, Journey, Air Supply, Coney Hatch and Heart comes solo artist Bobby Milford from Portland USA.

This ten track CD is a pretty good mixture of AOR/pop/rock and ballads that fans of the aforementioned acts should really enjoy. Check out the song 'Sailor's Song (Moon Mistress)', a song similar in structure to Faith Nation, Harlan Cage and Marillion. This is a great atmospheric melodic rock song, where the vocals sound similar to Larry Greene and Fish.

'Nobody But You' is a killer ballad reminding me of Timothy Lewis' 'Hold U 2Night' and is dead catchy, whilst the piano led 'Tearing Us Apart' is the big power ballad. Bobby's vocals are so much like Steve Perry and Steve Augeri on this song that it could easily be Journey themselves.

Also in this vein is the superb ballad 'Can I Hold You' which also shows comparisons to Stan Bush and is a great summery AOR ballad with nice keyboards.

The pure Journey influences really show on 'Ethereal' which reminds me of 'Feeling That Way' and 'Lights' and pre "Escape" era Journey. and is a fantastic song with great backing harmony vocals.

I have to say that the production whilst not perfect does sound very nice and makes this album very enjoyable indeed. Check out the cool laid back 'And Kiss You' for some superb vocal harmonies, whilst this track sounds a little to dated, it does build into a superb song and reminds me of Prior Park and Marillion.

'Forbidden' is a more melodic based song that is almost a ballad, this is the type of haunting melodic ballad that you would find Enuff 'Z Nuff performing. The vocals are once again magic on this song, very much like Donnie Vie.

Also very good is the up tempo catchy AOR pop of 'If I'd Only Known' which is one of my favorite songs on the CD and comes across in a wave of Harlan Cage meets Prior Park and Savannah with nice clean guitar melodies.

Another spectacular light weight AOR number is 'Running On Empty'  which is a superb 80's song along the lines of Hugo, Steel Breeze and Thrills with a touch of Marillion and is pure AOR. The chorus is bright and catchy and Bobby's vocals are superb.

The best song is the rocking opening track 'Primitive Love', this song is very catchy and just rocks in the same vein as Stan Bush, The Storm, Carl Dixon, Def Leppard etc.. and is a killer track to sing along with, 'Primitive Love' is one of those songs where you now you've heard it somewhere before.

Overall Milford has the potential to go far, the songs are very well performed and diverse, all he needs to do is really concentrate on more rocking songs like Primitive Love' and not so many ballads and then we will have a killer CD that will see Bobby signed without a doubt. Until then this will do nicely and you can check him out at www.mp3.com/ 

Nicky Baldrian

|The MP3 Songs|Nikammusic Productions|Rock Cafe|Music Mayer|