2013 CD Reviews - S.U.N. - Something Unto Nothing

[TageRyche]

Artist: S.U.N.
Album: Something Unto Nothing
Label: Robo Records      Released: 2013
http://www.somethinguntonothing.com

The debut album from S.U.N. comes with the promotional statement that the album is a concept record. The concept being a no-frills, unfashionable, click-track/auto-tune free, Loud Gypsy Rock record. And for the most part, I have to agree. The band comes with a pretty solid musical pedigree.

Singer Sass Jordan is a Juno award winning rocker from Canada. Two of her solo CDs (Racine and Rats) are balls out rockers and her voice is instantly identifiable. Brian Tichy handles guitar (and bass on three tracks) but he is perhaps best known for his work as a drummer with Whitesnake, Foreigner and Billy Idol. Michael Devin has played bass for Whitesnake, Kenny Wayne Shepherd and Lynch Mob. Drummer Tommy Stewart has bashed the skins for Godsmack, Fuel and Everclear.

You roll all that experience together and you get a smoking hot pure rock and roll album.

Tichy and Jordan co-wrote 8 of the 13 tracks together (they also produced the album together) with Devin co-writing four other songs with them.

The album opens with a gut ripping up tempo rocker called "Burned". The bluesy rock song also immediately ensures to the listener that Sass Jordan's voice is still killer.

The first single from the album is called "I'm The One". It is the perfect song to introduce the band to people with. It is another up tempo rock song and you can check out the video for the song below.

There is an instrumental on the disc called "The Beginning of the End". It was written by Tichy alone and the vibe the song has is utterly cool.

The songs "Wide Ocean" and "Something Unto Nothing" are two sides of the same coin. The songs each start out in a deliberate style and then kicks up the rock-n-roll power chords later in the song. But with "Wide Ocean", the change in vocal style from Jordan practically renders her a shadow of herself. I liked the lyrics in the first verse of the song, but when the pace picks up 2 minutes into the song, you quickly realize that they should've rocked out the whole way through the song.

Meanwhile, the title track shows that you can have a sense of restraint in your playing and throw a twist on your vocal delivery but still sound like yourselves. Four minutes into the song, they begin to rock out again, but this time it feels like a natural progression rather than something to completely throw off the feel of the track.

"Mobile Again" finds the band taking a lyrical shot at some modern day topics (politics, etc). The song isn't bad, but really didn't feel all that special.

The odd instrumentation sound and vocal delivery of "Did Me No Good" left me cold. But enough of the nitpicks, onto the killer stuff.

They might bill themselves as gypsy rock, but they manage to throw in some boogie-woogie feel with the song "No Way Home".

The closest thing the band has to a ballad is "If I Was You". However, if you are expecting some sappy warmed over retread from the 80's power ballad overload, stop right there. This song has far more testicular fortitude than most ballads could hope to achieve. While I realize the irony of saying that about a song where Sass Jordan was involved in crafting the song, my statement stands. I loved the lyrics in the song including the following passage:

"Don't show me the game
Just show me the rules
'Cos I am feeling pretty seasick
on this big old ship of fools"

The best track on the CD for me was the mid tempo number "Nomad". The sound of the song is epic, and I could just imagine it as the featured song in some kind of post-apocalyptic lost world kind of movie. The song grows into more of a rocker three minutes in and the drumming from Tommy Stewart really resonated on this song. As I listened, I could really feel the power and rhythm he was creating.

S.U.N is a sort of super group but instead of a group of individuals thrown together to do a specialty project, they come off as a cohesive whole; a true melding of their individual talents. They turned out an album featuring some pretty good songs and whet the appetite for what they might come up with next. If you'll pardon the play on words, S.U.N. is just starting to rise and now is the time to get on board.

 

[RJhog (Admin)]

Nice review TR.  It's a really good album, top to bottom.  Mobile Again has great verses, but the chorus is kind of weak, lyrically speaking especially.  My favorite track is the title track, Something Unto Nothing.  Totally killer track.  And I thought the instrumental track was outstanding as well.  For a drummer, Tichy is one hell of a guitarist.

[TageRyche]

I was pretty damn impressed by Tichy's guitar work.