Customer Reviews

Premonition

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

When Sylvester Stallone was looking for a new song for ROCKY III
he listened to this album. Survivor had finally made the top 40 with "POOR MAN'S SON." I'm sure he had no idea just what would happen when he asked them to write the theme song. So I guess you could say that if not for this album, the words "EYE OF THE TIGER" would be nothing more then words form a script.
What we have here is a great album of rock. From the opening riff of "CHEVY NIGHTS" to the b-side of "EYE", "TAKE YOU ON A SATURDAY", this album was self produced by the band,(just look at the album cover) which means no "CORPORATE ROCK" here.
Jim Peterik and Frankie Sullivan wrote all of the songs. Every one of them finds way to tug at your heart. The haunting "HEART'S A LONELY HUNTER" (which by the way is my favorite) to the rock n roll fantasy "LIGHT OF A THOUSAND SMILES" (which is something everyone of us has done at least once in our lives) not to forget the homecoming tear jerker "RUNWAY LIGHTS" this album will make you feel good when you listen to it.

"Premonition" is Survivor's second album and, by far, their best. In their first three albums, Survivor's music was more of a driving guitar rock sound. This changed with the release of 1984's "Vital Signs" album when the band fell more into a "glamour rock" type of style. With songs like "Runway Lights" and "Chevy Nights", this album is a must for every rock fan.

A+

This was one of my favorite 80's cds. Just a great feel good effort. Great melodies and vocals from Dave Bickler. I felt like Survivor went bubblegum after he left. This one had at least 4 potential radio hits and never got any air play. That sort of thing started happening alot after MTV cranked up and injected cancer into the american music scene. This cd rocks. You definitely won't be sorry you bought it. Their first cd is very good as well.

The song that made me go out and actually by the whole album, though, was the lead-off track "Chevy Nights." I would have loved this song back when I drove my Caprice... Introduced to me through Rocktopia.net's "Aohra Rock" podcast featuring the beautiful Pilar Sanchez, I was loving Stephan Ellis' big round Fender P-bass over Marc Droubay's up-tempo drumline. Then, Frankie Sullivan's crunchy Marshall-amped Gibson finishes out the into before Dave Bickler's vocals kicks it off within the Radio "ramp limit." My favorite part of this song is the chorus. Like much of the album, Jim perfectly composes Stephan and Frankie's lines such that the right chords are formed so even though you're really only hearing a simple drum, bass, guitar combo with some piano accent and Bickler's stellar vocals, it sounds much fuller.

Latter tracks leverage more overdubs to give some melodic range to guitar tracks, but this record doesn't use a whole lot of studio trickery. In fact, I would argue this entire CD is a textbook introduction to how to compose, perform and record rock music. A clean production with understated effects, perfectly mixed and EQ'd serves as a prime example to anyone touching a Pro-Tools install for the first time what tracks SHOULD sound like. You can Hear all the frequencies of the bass strings, all of the timbre of the drumkit's snare... Frankie is not shredding like crazy or overusing mindless barre chords; it's a lot of stuff on the 5th, 4th and 3rd strings, just two or three note chords and lets the amp do the rest. Listen to Droubay's tracks: Rock Steady. Constantly well timed hits; not a lot of crazy fills to try and grab your attention, just naturally attention-grabbing groves and tasteful symbol work.

Finally, let's get into the song writing. Google the lyrics to "Light of a Thousand Smiles." You will seldom listen to a more positive, hopeful piece of writing for a rock song. This song speaks to all of us who've heard our favorite rock song on the radio, and dreamed of the day that we, too, would take the stage and perform in the light of a thousand fans smiling upon us.

It comes HIGHLY recommended by me, and I really have not been able to stop listening to this whole recording since the day I bought it a few months ago.

"Chevy Nights," from the Premonition LP, was one of the first Survivor songs to get airplay. It's still a favorite. One story has it that Sylvester Stallone loved Premonition (especially the song "Poor Man's Son") and became a Survivor fan, eventually asking the band to write a song for his new Rocky movie; "Eye of the Tiger," probably the band's biggest hit, turned out to be that song. Survivor guitarist Jim Peterik was a member of The Ides of March, which had a #2 hit in 1970 with "Vehicle."

It seems all of us Survivor fans have our favorites, huh? I really enjoy this CD, but I can't quite put it up there with their first one, "Eye Of The Tiger", or "Caught In The Game".

I bought the "Premonition" record back in college. I'm not sure when I bought it relative to their other material, but it was definitely after "Eye Of The Tiger", "Vital Signs", and "Survivor", and possibly after "When Seconds Count" and "Caught In The Game". It was either right before or right after I got a CD player, and since this was on record, it was at a disadvantage. I found it in the bargain bin, just like I found the debut record. I had been floored by the debut album, so I had high expectations for this one. I had heard "Take You On A Saturday" before, since it was the B-side to the "Eye Of The Tiger" single. I played the record, thought it was pretty good, but not as good as the first one. And I didn't put this one on a tape for the car, and I didn't play it as much since I was playing more CDs than records back then, and I kinda forgot about it until recently. Since it is now on CD, I figured it would be a good way to complete my Survivor collection.

I bought the debut CD a couple of weeks before buying this one (along with "Caught In The Game"), and I've been playing all my Survivor CDs ever since then. This one definitely has more of the signature Survivor sound than the first one, and it's pretty close to "Eye Of The Tiger" and "Caught In The Game". The main reason I put this one below the others is because to me this one lacks multiple songs that are really great. "Take You On A Saturday" is my favorite - it really rocks - but it's the only one on this disc that would be on my list of all-time favorite Survivor songs.

I would really give this CD 4.5 stars, but what the heck, I'll give it five because I really do like Survivor, and this is a good CD. I just never gave the record enough of a chance to grow on me years ago.

If you like "Eye Of The Tiger", which is the most likely album that most non-die-hard Survivor fans would have from the pre "Vital Signs" era, chances are you'll like this too. If you're just starting to build a Survivor collection, I'd start with either "Eye Of The Tiger" or one of the greatest hits CDs to see if you like the Dave Bickler era material. If so, then I'd get this one once you know you like "Eye Of The Tiger" and "Caught In The Game". Also get the debut CD - it doesn't have exactly the same sound as "Premonition" or the other two, but it is really good.

Survivor's second album "Premonition" is the first Survivor album which carries the very sound that we are familiar. Their self-titled debut album is a good album with a bunch of great rock. But the album as a whole sounded too varied to grasp the image of the band. Kind of a Know-it-all all hits collection pop rock band. They failed to impress a large number of music fans and I think it was Jim himself who was not satisfied with the album. But with this second album they surely acquired the banner something unique and impressive.

Part of the reason this album became excellent probably came from Jim's collaboration with Sammy Hager's solid rock track "Heavy Metal". It was in 1981, the word heavy metal was still not a household word. I can imagine Jim's mumbling heavymetal, heavymetal...while producing this album and he was confident that style of rock would dominate.

A light of Thousands Smiles served as a prophcy as the word premonition was taken from the lyric of this track. Take You On A Saturday is one of the highlight of this album-- very tight heavy track which might overwhelm die-hard Kiss fans.

But what Jim Peterik and Frankie Sullivan tried to do in this album is to create the style of Heavy Metal not for rock's sake but with mass appeal. With the mission on their shoulders Survivor as we know it finally launched and the album became a small success in the U.S. with excellent tracks such as Chevy Nights, hits like Poor Man's Son, and Summer Nights. Recommended for all Survivor fans, 80s heavy metal rock fans, Sammy Hager fans, and Europian MHR fans.

If you love their song "eye of the tiger" and never invested in any of their albums-then you've missed out on a LOT of great music-including this,their second release!AS a matter of fact,ALL their albums (except for maybe 'caught in the game')are very strong,including the first one,also now available on c.d. They also deserve credit for replacing their excellent lead vocalist(Dave Bickler) with the awesome Jimi Jameson(Dave sang on the first four albums)Do yourself a favor and check out this band that easily could have been a HUGE sucsess with a little more support from the music industry.

HOW DO YOU COMPARE SURVIVOR WITH DAVE BICKLER OR JIMI JAMISON???
YOU CAN'T, THEY ARE 2 DIFFERENT BANDS...
THE ORIGINAL SURVIVOR HAS HARDER EDGED SONGS AND JIMI JAMISON HAD THE BIGGEST HITS & THE BALLADS...
I THINK CAUGHT IN THE GAME IS THE BEST DAVE BICKLER ALBUM RECORDED...
EVERY SONG IS GOOD FROM BEGINNING TO END, THERE ARE NO FILLERS ON THIS ALBUM, CAIUGHT IN THE CAME WAS THE FIRST DAVE BICKLER ALBUM I EVER BOUGHT, I HAD MY DOUBTS AS I HAD JUST BEEN INFECTED WITH VITAL SIGNS, AND BOY WAS I WRONG CAUGHT INTHE GAME WAS A GREAT ALBUM, I LOVED IT INSTANTLY...
I HAVE READ ALOT OF REVIEWERS WHO FAVOR JACKIE DON'T GO, AS THEIR FAVORITE, I HAVE TO AGREE ON THIS ONE...
BUT AGAIN I CAN'T SINGLE OUT 1 SONG AS BEING BETTER THAN ANOTHER...
I NEVER STOPPED LOVING YOU, READY FOR THE REAL THING, WHAT DO YOU REALLY THINK?, HALF LIFE ALL GREAT SONGS, AND JUST AS GOOD AS JACKIE DON'T GO, THE HARD ROCKIN' TITLE SONG CAUGHT IN THE GAME...
THIS IS A MUST FOR ALL SURVIVOR FANS...

I remember hearing "Poor Man's Son" on the radio in 1981 and wondering who that was, really liking it. I'd never heard of Survivor and would not hear of them again - until the next year.

1982's "Eye Of The Tiger" was a huge hit, as well all know.

What we all seem to miss is the original issue dates of these albums; Premonition was released *before* Eye Of The Tiger. It was *re-issued* after Eye hit it big. If you find the LPs, look at the release numbers on them - Premonition came first. Yet many fans thing it was the second album. Thanks to some good San Francisco rock station, which has long since gone blander than tofu and/or been bought by Clear Channel, I *knew* who Survivor was, sort of, when they made it big.

So, it was neat to see a case of commercial redemption, where a band was able to follow on a hit album by re-issuing their earlier material after it was ignored.

Premonition is mandatory in any Survivor fan's collection. It's raw-edged David Bickler stuff. It manages to capture a great deal of the teen male angst that they tried to appeal to. While it's not the work of art that 'Foreigner' was, it belongs next to it.