Most people know only one song or album from Irish rockers Thin
\nLizzy. If you ask them to name a song, they’ll undoubtedly select
\n“The Boys Are Back In Town”; if they say they own one of their
\nalbums, odds are it’s Thin Lizzy’s 1976 effort
\nJailbreak<\/i>.<\/p>\n
But Phil Lynott and crew proved time and time again that they
\nwere capable of rocking with the big boys, even if they weren’t
\nquite ready for superstardom. Exhibit “A”: their 1975 release
\nFighting<\/i>, which is just as entertaining an album as
\nJailbreak<\/i>, even if it takes a few listens to really absorb
\neverything about it.<\/p>\n
This album was, in some ways, still an adjusting for the band.
\nGuitarist Scott Gorham had just joined one album prior, and he
\nstill was fine-tuning the two-guitar attack with Brian Robertson
\ninto the sound that would make the band well-known. Brian Downey’s
\ndrums were already at that next level, but Lynott, for some strange
\nreason, decided to keep his bass work hidden in the mix. Maybe this
\nhas been corrected with CD technology, but Lynott’s bass work would
\nhave been better had it been more in front of the music.<\/p>\n
Of all the songs on
\nFighting<\/i>, probably “Roaslie” is the one people know. A short
\nlove song, “Rosalie” showed the greatness the band had to offer
\nwhile it demonstrated the need for the two-guitar attack to gel a
\nlittle more. Fortunately, this weakness is quickly corrected in the
\nalbum, as songs like “Suicide” and “Fighting My Way Back” both show
\nhow well Gorham and Robertson’s guitars sounded when they blended
\ntogether.<\/p>\n
Lynott’s storytelling qualities are evident throughout many of
\nthe tracks on
\nFighting<\/i>. Songs like “King’s Vengeance,” “Freedom Song” and
\n“Suicide” all paint vivid pictures in the listener’s mind, helping
\nthe songs take more of a root in you. It is a technique that works,
\nand works well.<\/p>\n
There are one or two weak moments on
\nFighting<\/i>. I, for one, didn’t like the more experimental
\nnature of “Ballad Of A Hard Man,” a song that was anything but a
\nballad. It just didn’t seem to fit with the overall mood of the
\nalbum… though it probably would have fit well on some other
\nalbum. The only other real negative is that you really have to pay
\nattention to
\nFighting<\/i> to be able to appreciate all its nuances. If you
\nonly give it a casual listen while you diddle away at the computer
\nplaying Pac-Man, then a lot of the special qualities of this album
\nare going to be lost on you.<\/p>\n
All that said,
\nFighting<\/i> is not the easiest album to get through when you
\ngive it total brain power. Sure, it’s a quick enough album, but
\nthere’s just enough rust on the album to make it a more difficult
\nlisten. Still, it’s an effort worth putting forth.<\/p>\n
Why isn’t
\nFighting<\/i> considered a classic like
\nJailbreak<\/i> is? Who knows? But, with the expected release of
\nthe Thin Lizzy box set later this year, maybe it will revive some
\ninterest in both this album and the band.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":27845,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[5891],"rating":[5615],"class_list":["post-39232","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-thin-lizzy","rating-rating-b"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/39232","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39232"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/39232\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27845"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39232"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=39232"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=39232"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}