SURPRISE OF MAY 2003

TALISMAN
"CATS AND DOGS"

(Frontiers)


I have to say that I was waiting the new album of Talisman with a lot of anxiety. The album that Marcel Jacob and Soto have released under the name of Humanimal, was not only an excellent hard album but as Marcel told me, it was something like an "experiment" for the band, to see the reaction of the fans, as it concerns the music style of the band. I totally believe that the "experiment" was successful as the result was the new album of Talisman. Solid hard rock guitars (the band has a new guitarist named Fredrik Akesson), fantastic vocal melodies, extraordinary bass-lines from Marcel and in general a strong rhythm section, and of the unique warm and hard rocker voice of Jeff is here! I'm sure that the fans of the band will be very satisfied when they listen to "Cats And Dogs", cause it is true that Talisman are not only very talented band but they also know how to wit\rite beautiful melodic hard rock songs. I think that the fans of good melodic hard rock music it's about time to "discover" Talisman. The songs of the album have a lot of variety and no song is in the same style with another one. That is something that makes me to like this album even more. The songs that you should listen from this album are the funk-ish "Skin On Skin", the heavy "Break It Down", the volatile mid-tempo "Love Will Come Again", the explosive hard rocker "Outta My Way", the melodic emotional "Sorry", the memorable "Wherever, Whenever, Whatever" and the dark heavy "Lost In The Wasteland". Marcel and Jeff managed to write the some of the most melodic, heavy and catchy songs that they have ever released! Yes, I'm not exaggerating. "Cats And Dogs" is one of the strongest albums of this year and one of the three better albums of Talisman. Some of you may say that "Cats And Dogs" is the best album of the band, but I can only say to that that only time can "prove" it. The one and only sure thing is that this album is an excellent and so qualitative hard rock work, in other words It's an album that only few bands can release. And Talisman sure is one of those bands. I cannot imagine that a fan of melodic hard rock music do not have, or even haven't listened to, "Cats And Dogs". So there are only two ways as it concerns that album! Buy or steal it!!!

by Thanos Aggelakis 9/10