It is fair to say ROBIN MCAULEY has been doing this for quite some time now. From providing his melodic yet powerful vocals to records from GRAND SLAM, as well as singing on THE FAR CORPERATION's decisive version of "Stairway To Heaven" he is best known for his time in MSG with whom they produced 3 studio albums and one live unplugged album, Heck, he was even in SURVIVOR for a while. McAuley has also produced a couple of solo albums, first back in 1991 and more recently with 2021's "Standing on the Edge", so, "Alive" is a pretty darn fast return to producing solo music.

On top of this ROBIN has been vocalist for BLACK SWAN an "all-star" band with REB BEACH, JEFF PILSON and MATT STAR, which you seriously should check out their two mighty fine albums. Plus adding some vocals to the Michael Schenker fest albums AND finding time to fill in for the then incumbent MSG vocalist Ronnie Romero at Steelhouse Festival in Wales in 2022, and was amazing that day by the way!  Our ROBIN has recently been a very busy boy!

Which brings up to this, his second album for the home of the greatest melodic rock, Frontiers Music Srl and is called "ALIVE".  Do not be confused this is not A "live" album, but it is an album "Alive" with hard rocking, yet melodic, upbeat and uplifting songs all of which showcase MCAULEY's vocals to perfection.  That is not to say the band are not up to the challenge of supporting the singer's talents, they are, as is the production, something one comes to expect from a Frontiers release

I am not going to do a song-by-song analysis with this record, what you need to know is the standard and quality of what is on offer is consistently high across all 11 songs.  What we have here is three quarters of an hour of high-grade melodic rock with all the ingredients, a big beat, suitably wailing guitars, and on-point vocals, all delivered with enough polish and poise.

From the slower burn of title track "Alive" to the big guitar-driven "Who I Am" every song is Positive and up up up! Even the "ballad" "Can't Go On" which does have a full-on 80's AOR vibe (perhaps that time with SURVIVOUR did rub of on ROBIN) is not mawkish of saccharine.  This is just a fine example of its type.

I'll be honest this is a mighty fine album and I have been blessed with some fantastic albums to review recently, and my only wafer-thin niggle with it is perhaps a little more light and shade or THAT one song that stretched and challenged the band and ROBIN's abilities a touch would have turned a 9 out of ten experience in to a 10 out of 10. Do not get me wrong you need to listen to this album, go out and buy this album! Do it! Do it now!