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Desolation Sound Salish Rock Review by Gary Hill This album has an intriguing mix of sounds from power-pop to alternative rock and more. There are a few standouts here, but nothing is really lacking. It's just that a few songs set the bar so high, that the rest feel a little less. This review is available in book (paperback and hardcover) form in Music Street Journal: 2024 Volume 2 More information and purchase links can be found at: garyhillauthor.com/Music-Street-Journal-2024.

Track by Track Review

Record Store This has a killer mainstream rock sound at play. This has a real power-pop kind of groove to it. I love the bass work on the song.

Deepest Garden While this is a strong tune, it's not as effective at the opener was. That's more about the strength of that track, though. This has more of an alternative rock feeling to it.

Yesterday Was Long Ago There is a hint of Southern rock in the mix. This seems to merge alternative rock with more of a classic sound. It's a solid tune, but not up to the same level as the two openers.

Arms Around You Power-pop, mainstream rock and alternative merge here. This is another tune that works well enough but doesn't really stand out. I do like the bass work on it quite a bit.

Evanesce Now, this is cool. There is an echoey, almost techno meets psychedelic edge to part of this. The cut has a meaty, hard rocking edge to it. It's driving and fierce. It's a highlight of the set that really stands tall.

Salish Rock The title track is a driving instrumental that has a lot of magic packed into it. It's another standout display of hard alternative rock with classic angles at play.

Caution to the Wind I like the guitar solo section of this quite a bit. Beyond that the song isn't anything exceptional, but it works well enough.

Never Forget You I really dig the slide guitar work on this song. It's a driving hard rocker with plenty of bluesy angles to it.

Beautiful Sun Coming in mellower, this builds out gradually. It has some real classic rock magic in the mix. It fits with the rest of the album, but has some new flavors in the mix. It's another standout tune.

The Artist Jangly guitar strumming brings this one in. The track works forward from there. It gets into more of the kind of alternative rock we've heard through much of the disc further down the road.

Can We Learn to Love Again? Keyboards start this. A balladic guitar joins after a time, and the song works out into an arrangement keeping with that concept. This builds out into more of a rocker, but it still remains less intense than some of the other music here. The instrumental break is positively inspired.

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