Electric Savage

Colloseum 2, Colosseum II | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (March 30, 1993)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: One Way Records Inc
• ASIN: B000002R3B
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  Vinyl  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #379,355 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. Put It This Way

2. All Skin & Bone

3. Rivers

4. The Scorch

5. Lament

6. Desperado

7. Am I

8. Intergalactic Strut

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Caution: Flammable, August 25, 2001

By 

El Kabong - See all my reviews

This review is from: Electric Savage (Audio CD)

Everybody's got that one album that took the blinkers off them; the one that damn near killed you on first listen with the excitement of whole new vistas opening up. In my case, that was this record, almost 25 years ago. I'd been into heavy rock for a few years when I bought this album, by a band whose name I'd never seen before. Needless to say, it blew me away with its instrumental fury and virtuoso playing....it sounded as though Colosseum II (Jon Hiseman, Don Airey, John Mole & Gary Moore) wrote and recorded these tracks specifically to please ME. Not quite jazz/rock. Much more like rock/jazz, driving and heavy but layered, intricate and absorbing in its (at the time) complexity. Of course, about a billion all-instrumental albums later, ELECTRIC SAVAGE doesn't stand quite as tall as it once did, but this is the one that doomed me to a life of searching obscure catalogues and haunting secondhand bins for that next knockout punch out of left field. (It's still true today. You can't complain about the sad state of rock if you're gonna let MTV, Rolling Stone and Top 40 radio determine your musical options...you've got to pack a lunch, grab a compass and go out searching if you want to find greatness). One Way Records (bless em) have released all 3 Colosseum II LPs on CD: this one, its antecedent STRANGE NEW FLESH (which features some vocals), and their masterful finale, WARDANCE. All are musts. Among the many highlights on SAVAGE, the lead tradeoffs of Moore and Airey throughout the album never sound less than vibrant, inspired, crackling with voltage. And for all of Gary Moore's recent success with his blues retro, he never approaches the mournful/blazing fire of his solo on 'Am I', one of two ballads here. Drummer Hiseman, whose first version of Colosseum never sounded like this, is more on and energized than he'd been in many years. Excellent and distinctive cover art, too. Well, what are ya waitin' for? BUY the damn thing already!

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Test of Time Does It Tame the Savage? I Think Not, July 15, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Electric Savage (Audio CD)

In the history of heavy sounding or hard-rock guitar there are few that can match the fire, passion and feeling of Gary Moore. And his peers know this well enough. After all, who did Jack Bruce & Ginger Baker choose to take the Eric Clapton spot when they decided to re-form a power-trio a few years ago calling it BBM in the process? But even BBM didn't quite cut it for me. They tried to be too slick, too commercial, too formulaic. The problem with listening to Gary Moore (which BBM should've corrected but didn't) is that he's quite often featured in songs without the requisite musicianship & bands without the proper chemistry to do his amazing guitar playing justice.

Well, as hardcore music fans who seek out obscure & underappreciated recordings have known for years, Moore's 3 mid-'70s fusion/prog-rock oriented records with Jon Hiseman's Colosseum II feature the pinnacle of his playing within a context sophisticated enough to synergize into legend, a small legend talked about only by the few initiated but a legend nonetheless.

For me it all started when I played a fusion-fanatic friend in high-school Moore's incredible solo on his remake of "Shapes of Things" on one of his old '80s heavy-metal solo albums. Listening, a grin surfaced slowly on his face & he informed me that yes, that solo was good, but if I wanted hear real musicianship around it rather than silly heavy-metal kid-stuff, to go find & buy all 3 Colosseum II albums. I did & 20 years later I still listen to these albums! The main reason is that this is fusion leaning very heavily on the rock-side, not too far from the mid'70s Jeff Beck stuff, & played with a lot of soul. The soul that often gets lost in fusion of a highly technical nature (as for example in some of Al Di Meola's electric recordings)is definitely not in short supply here. Aside from Moore, Jon Hiseman's the main reason for this, the driving force, the engine, as his amazing, ferociously showy but always fully controlled post-Cobham-White drumming sets-up the parameters within which Don Airy, Moore & John Mole, the bass player, operate par excellence. If you've ever liked the drumming style of guys like Neal Peart, Carl Palmer or Lenny White, then Hiseman's style will also floor you. From the scorching opener "Put It This Way," to the loud, bass-percussion driven ambience of the super-cool laid-back atmospheric groove in "All Skin & Bone" to the heart-felt ballad "Rivers" (the only song with vocals or lyrics, admittedly sung a bit weakly by Gary Moore, who was never a great singer, but the quality of the tune more than makes up for it), to the majestic wired sky-ripping firestorms of "Scorch," "Desperado" & "Intergalactic Strut" to the beautiful slow. loud pure-rock melodic grooves of "Lament," & "I AM," "Electric Savage" is one of those '70s fusion beasts that cannot be denied by reason of pure force, you know, just how amazingly cool it sounds blasted up to maximum volume. If you like virtuoso ROCK with fusion chops & I stress the word ROCK in the fusion equation, then this one is a sure bet to please

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars 4 Legends...Incredible Music, December 21, 2001

By 

Marlon Hill (des moines, iowa USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Electric Savage (Audio CD)

I agree with almost everything the previous reviewer stated. I heard Mahavishnu Orchestra and Return to Forever before Colosseum II. They were both awesome, but it all came together with Electric Savage. This is without a doubt the most fiery display of musicianship ever recorded in the jazz-rock-fusion genre. Gary Moore is the shredder on guitar. He started his career playing the blues, then played with Thin Lizzy before joining Colosseum II, which is a revamped version of the original Colosseum with Jon Hiseman on drums and John Mole on bass. And also on keyboards was the great Don Airey, who along with Gary Moore rip throughout the whole cd. My favorite track is -Put it This Way-. If you love jazz or rock or just great music, you need to get this cd. It is a masterpiece.