Ron Vogel - Us Mere Mortals

Hear The Track Here

Although I've known US based Alternative Indie musician Ron Vogel on Soundclick for ages, I only came up against him musically when I reviewed Blazing (November 2009),a nice slice of straight ahead rock that kinda set the seal on the next few tracks I reviewed. In this respect, Ron can certainly hold up his own in his chosen field because all of the tracks I have reviewed since then has been highly rated. Mind you, I do like a geetar player, as many of you are only too painfully aware. Ron first wrote this song in the 1980's during a similar financial crisis (the savings and loan one if I remember correctly) to the current one, just a matter of scale. He obviously saw the similarities and resurrected the song, even so it retains a surprisingly retro feel, the kind of track that could have come out of the period - especially in America where this kind of music was a big deal at the time.

Tell me, have a listen to the track. Doesn't the vocal remind you of Ian Anderson, erstwhile (and hirsute) singer and flautist of Jethro Tull? Certainly does me, until he gets into a prog-rock kinda American style and starts wailing like a banshee. Now, normally here there would be a mighty pulling of hair and gnashing of teeth because we are in very dangerous territory. Nonetheless, Ron saves the day by merely flavouring the track with that prog-rock influence, it's real roots are in early 1970's rock of the inspirational kind. Actually, casting my rusty mind back, I can't say that I have noticed before how good a vocalist Ron is. I've always recognised his guitar playing as something I like to hear.

In fact, reading back through my review of Staying Out Of The Way Of The Day (February 2010) I mentioned that the vocal could have been better but I definitely couldn't say that about this track, the vocal is nigh of perfect for this material. Now understand that I don't actually like this kind of rock, never have. It's all too American sounding for me, all a bit too histrionic, know what I mean? In Ron Vogel's case though, is an exception. Not just because of his incredibly tight, focused production, and the quality of the performance both instrumentally and vocally but more so because here is a song that wears its Christian heart on its sleeve and speaks what it sees. On that alone, I would have recommended this track, but the musical style that goes along with it is a wonderful bonus.

Highly Recommended Alternative rock.