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Stone Broken - Ain't Always Easy

Released - March 2nd 2018 via Spinefarm Records

Track Listing
  1. Worth Fighting For
  2. Let Me See It All
  3. Heartbeat Away
  4. Home
  5. Follow Me
  6. I Believe
  7. Doesn't Matter
  8. Anyone
  9. Just A Memory
  10. Other Side Of Me
  11. The Only Thing I Need

 I will admit straight away that I'm a bit late to the Stone Broken party. I was aware of them as a band and I liked their single 'Stay all night' from the debut album 'All in Time'. Maybe that means I can better judge the second effort 'Ain't Always Easy' on it's own merits without a reference to earlier work.
Upon my first listen there are two things that stand out, and based on these two things will tell you whether Stone Broken and this album is for you. The first is that vocalist/guitarist Rich Moss sound remarkably similar to Chad Kroeger of Nickelback fame. The second is that instrumentally they sound remarkably similar to Black Stone Cherry crossed with Nickelback. Now that might be enough to turn some people of straight away but bear with me. They might have that Nickelback sound, but with none of the stigma attached and delivered with less of the 'cheese' factor so you can listen guilt free. Overall it's a mixture I'm happy with so lets get down to the blow by blow....

'Worth Fighting For' is a solid opener that has a chorus that is destined for arenas with some low down and dirty riffage to fill the gaps. 'Let Me See It All' has a slow groove that along with the lyrics could be a new favourite on the stripper/pole dancer scene. 'Heartbeat Away' has a similar feel to the opener and definitely sets style of the album to come. If you don't like it by this point you could probably stop listening now unless you're only here for the slow songs. That brings us to 'Home'. You could start to forget that this a British band with this American sounding arena rock ballad. Not necessarily a bad thing if like that sort of stuff. I do personally. 'Follow me', 'I Believe' and Doesn't Matter' carry on the theme of the first three tracks. Big riffs with a melodic chorus. That sounds great on the face of it but maybe it could be considered too much of the same. They don't stray too far from that sound throughout the album. The next ballad is 'Anyone'. Similar to 'Home' it has that feeling it should be live somewhere in the USA. 'Just A Memory' has an opening riff that that firmly shows there metal influences and wouldn't be out of place on a Metallica album. The chorus goes back to the drawn out chords and open vocals in keeping with the rest of the album. 'Other Side Of Me' is more of the same. There aren't any surprises on this album. The album closer 'The Only Thing I Need' is a little bit different but only in the way it sounds the most like Nickleback in the cheesy way.

Overall this is not a bad album and you could easily leave it on and not skip any songs along the way. Would you remember many of them afterwards? I'm not so sure but that doesn't mean I didn't enjoy and wouldn't put it on again. What it lacks in originality it makes up for in quality and consistency.

Rating : 7 out of 10

Best Song : Worth Fighting For
Worst Song : The Only Thing I Need
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