The Rock United-Baptized in oil

Self-produced

2008

The Rock United are a hard rock outfit from from Sweden. Okay, that applies to a heap of aspiring bands these days. This band isn't going to be confused with the many hair bands that are part of that scene. They play a brand of hard rock that comes out of the 1970's AC/DC approach although that doesn't completely define their sound. I think that this band has moments where they march to the beat of a different drummer or you may just think that they are odd. There are bits of doo-whop, country and punk rock beats tossed into their sound. They churn out some straight up rockers too. The lyrics are perhaps more off the wall than the music on occasion, but not really clever enough to be shocking. "Baptized in oil" often has me thinking that this is what Little Caesar may have wished that their 1990 self-titled debut would have sounded like. The Rock United have that rawness mixed with the basic rock approach. There are countless bands playing AC/DC inspired rock, but this band is trying harder to put their own twist into it. They succeed in getting my attention and they get points for the effort and attempting to bring in some humor. On the downside some of the lyrics fall flat at times. Also there are some very ordinary songs on here as and I don't think that the band had enough ideas or hooks to sustain the 14 songs included on this disc. Chopping a few songs off probably would have helped. It's an above average album that benefits from being slightly against the grain. Still it's not going to be every one's bag and I think they have some work to do before they completely convince me. However they do enough to warrant a listen.

www.myspace.com/therockunited