Following a successful European run, Irish-American rock ‘n’ roll supergroup Black Star Riders will be touring the US to showcase their debut album All Hell Breaks Loose. With 32 shows planned, Black Star Riders will stop at various cities around the country including Milwaukee’s Turner Hall on May 29th.
Fans of rock legend Thin Lizzy will find much to love about Black Star Riders. In 2010, after several reunion tours, Thin Lizzy lead guitarist Scott Gorham announced a new line-up and plans for a new album. After two years, an announcement was made that a new Thin Lizzy album had been recorded but would not carry the band’s name out of respect for the band’s late singer, Phil Lynott. Instead, the album would be released under a new band name, Black Star Riders, with the band being described as “the next step in the evolution of the Thin Lizzy story.”
Citing a fear that fans would reject a new Thin Lizzy album featuring a new singer almost thirty years after the death of Lynott, singer Ricky Warwick acknowledged that he himself would be against a new Thin Lizzy album without Lynott. As a result, the band decided that a name change was all that would be needed to keep fans satisfied.
Musically, Black Star Riders fits into the hard rock/classic rock category like its predecessor, Thin Lizzy. Anyone who is familiar with the Thin Lizzy classics “The Boys Are Back in Town” or “Jailbreak” knows what to expect of Black Star Riders, but with a new singer who sounds remarkably like the late Phil Lynott. For the uninitiated, Black Star Riders carries the torch left behind by Thin Lizzy. With that torch comes vocal harmonies, melodic and distorted guitar riffs, shredding guitar solos, clean and passionate vocals, heavy drum beats and bass lines, and songs covering everything from ex-girlfriends to a young band looking to make it big playing rock ’n’ roll.
If you are a fan of Thin Lizzy, or classic rock in general, don’t miss the Black Star Riders at Turner Hall, May 29th in Milwaukee. The upcoming tour for All Hell Breaks Loose may be Black Star Riders’ inaugural US tour in support of their debut album, but by fall, the boys will be back in the studio for their second record. If all goes well in the states, BSR fans across the nation can look forward to a second US tour in 2015.