{"id":54445,"date":"2017-02-24T00:00:39","date_gmt":"2017-02-24T00:00:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/?p=54445"},"modified":"2017-04-17T16:17:22","modified_gmt":"2017-04-17T16:17:22","slug":"album-review-mike-tramp-maybe-tomorrow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/album-review-mike-tramp-maybe-tomorrow\/","title":{"rendered":"MIKE TRAMP – Maybe Tomorrow (2017) | Album \/ EP Reviews @ Metal Forces Magazine"},"content":{"rendered":"

MIKE TRAMP
Maybe Tomorrow<\/strong><\/span>
\n\"\"
\nTarget (2017)<\/span>
Rating: 5\/10<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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I\u2019ll never deny the talent that former White Lion \/ Freak Of Nature frontman Mike Tramp has, but over the years his easy on the ear solo sways have breezed by like a soothing but forgettable wind. I also won\u2019t deny however the maturity expressed within his solo albums or his ability to bring a tear, but this guy has been coming of age for a while now and this tenth solo studio outing really doesn\u2019t bring anything new to the table.<\/p>\n

Sure, there\u2019s an electric twist thrown in to his personal journeys and reflective forays, and his last opus Nomad<\/em><\/a> (2015) was a decent effort, but the contemporary style of country-tinged rock and overall calmness is starting to wear.<\/p>\n

Opener \u2018Coming Home\u2019 is a pleasant, simplistic rocker with a catchy jangle and breezy melody, but it\u2019s so middle of the road that I\u2019m transported to an uneventful desert setting of tumbleweed. This is the sort of mid-paced Americanized rock I\u2019d expect from, say, John Mellencamp and the likes. It\u2019s not big, it\u2019s not clever and it\u2019s not exactly entertaining in its modesty.<\/p>\n

Sadly, there are a handful of tracks on this offering which all melt into one big harmless plod; Tramp\u2019s effortless but now seemingly unremarkable tone does very little to lift the likes of \u2018What More Can I Say\u2019, \u2018Spring\u2019 and \u2018Would I Lie To You\u2019. Yep, it\u2019s all honest, heartfelt and homely by design with occasional beefiness, as with \u2018Leaving One Day\u2019 and probably my favourite cut \u2018Rust And Dust\u2019, but the harsh reality is, in spite of the talent and in spite of the musicians within, this is still a mediocre ride. We get simple bass trickles, nice acoustic strums and some flavours of organ and piano, but this could be anyone with Tramp well and truly in his comfort zone and relaying all-too familiar passages which at times appear colourless and flavourless.<\/p>\n

\u2018Time And Place\u2019 does rescue us from the banality with its gracile manner but it\u2019s all too fleeting; Tramp clearly aiming his fluffy arrow at is die-hard fans and never concerned with breaking out of the box. <\/p>\n

The album offers up ten agreeable songs which have sprigs of haunting atmosphere and touching prowess. It\u2019s indicative as a record of his prolific nature, but sometimes one can have too much of a good thing and I sense that Maybe Tomorrow<\/em> is a suggestion that Mike Tramp needs to take a well-earned break. I rarely have questioned his ability, but the continuous flow of rootsy, traditional and very much no frills rock has become a tad too routine for my liking.<\/p>\n

A fine songwriter such as this should always be challenging himself, but with this record I just don\u2019t hear such energy or electricity, and because such an opus is bereft of spark I just can\u2019t rate it highly. Maybe Tomorrow<\/em> is very much an average record, although as one of the track titles asks, \u2018Why Even Worry At All\u2019? But it\u2019s that laid-back sort of tone which pretty much sums up the album and my frustration for it.<\/p>\n

Neil Arnold<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MIKE TRAMPMaybe Tomorrow Target (2017)Rating: 5\/10 I\u2019ll never deny the talent that former White Lion \/ Freak Of Nature frontman Mike Tramp has, but over the years his easy on the ear solo sways have breezed by like a soothing but forgettable wind. I also won\u2019t deny however the maturity expressed within his solo albums […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24,2399],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-54445","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-album-ep-reviews","category-mike-tramp"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54445","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=54445"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54445\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":54451,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54445\/revisions\/54451"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=54445"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=54445"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=54445"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}