If you think Sly Stone took a long time to record an album in his heyday, consider this, Bostonians Mach Bell and Dave Zolla began writing the songs that make up the self-titled Last Man Standing 11-song CD in the spring of 1996 and completed the recordings on August 29, 2001. The result is the most polished and exciting disc featuring the former lead singer of Thundertrain and MCA recording artist that was the third and final version of the Joe Perry Project before Aerosmith took Perry back into the fold. This record is an absolute assault, and for fans of hard rock and heavy metal, the boys just rip it apart. Artie Knyff from L-88 is on bass, his band reaching number one on the regional charts in the early '80s, opening for Blue Öyster Cult when that band was hot stuff, and garnering interest from Arista, while co-songwriter and producer Dave Zolla was one of the mainstays of Buckingham, a progressive unit that had an immense regional following. These veterans of New England's hard rock scene come back with a vengeance, as this album has everything all their previous outfits did not. To put it plainly, had this Zolla/Bell CD come out as the third Joe Perry Project album, Once a Rocker, Always a Rocker, Aerosmith might've not come back when they did. It is that good. In the second to last track, "Miles and Miles," Bell yells out "...meanwhile, I was still thinking..." The Chuck Berry line that Marc Bolan re-immortalized in "Bang a Gong." "Bang a Gong (Get It On)" was cut by the Perry Project, as Aerosmith remade a killer version of "Helter Skelter." The "when I get to the bottom I go back to the top" line follows T. Rex here, Mach Bell giving an ode to his past and to his favorite band, which took his most famous lead guitarist away. This elaborate package was crafted with care and excellence, from the superb cover art and lyric booklet to the thunderous sound of the band. Mach Bell has never sounded this good, and the guitar playing sounds like it is straight out of the Randy Rhoads school of non-stop crunch. "New Day Blues" opens up with a flurry of Jimi Hendrix riffs starting with "Stone Free" while "Dr. Doctor" gives a nod to Bell's original band Thundertrain's New England hit "Hot for Teacher." Many of Thundertrain's rabid fans felt Van Halen lifted too much from that local hit, but this new edition plays more like West, Bruce & Laing. The nearest thing to a ballad is the Alice Cooper-ish "Still Dreaming (What Could Be)" on an album chock-full of Mach Bell's trademark tongue-in-cheek humor and Dave Zolla's real debut as a guitarist to be reckoned with. Few are playing traditional hard rock like this veteran singer, and it will be interesting to see if Bell's friends in Aerosmith are influenced by this powerful stuff -- you know they found copies in their mail box. Superb hard rock played to the hilt.
© Joe Viglione /TiVo