Janne Stark's Top 10 of 2025

Janne Stark Top 10 2025

Here's my Top 10 of 2025, plus some honorable mentions!

1. A.C.T: Eternal Winter – The proggy Swedes never disappoint! Another stellar album! A quirky and melodic musical journey that should attract both prog and AOR fans. Always and still top-notch song writing and performance! 

2. The Mind Palace: Birthrite – Outstanding Swedish melodic hard rock with a unique singer, great songs and great production!

3. Danko Jones – Leo Rising – Danko Jones never fails. Yet another great rockin’ release from these raw rocking Canadians! Riffs meet garage with a punk attitude. Tight and rockin’! Love it!

4. Wytch Hazel: V: Lamentations – I just love these druid rockers, and even more after seeing them live in Sweden. Quirky retro hard rockers that may as well have released this album in the late 70s. Stellar stuff!

5. Inglorious: V – After some years of confusion Inglorious returns with a stellar riff monster. They are definitely back with a vengeance!

6. Warlung: The Poison Touch – Another stellar release by these retro heavy rockers mixing doomy riffs with solid melodic vocals and stellar harmonies. Their best album? Possibly! 

7. Dusty Rose Gang: A-one From Day One – I had to check several times to make sure this wasn’t a hidden previously unreleased early/mid seventies heavy rock album. The sound and style are so authentic it’s scary! If it was recorded in 1972 it would have been up there with Stray Dog, Captain Beyond and Sir Lord Baltimore.

8. Bone Church: Deliverance – The third album mixing the sounds of stoner rock, NWoBHM and classic 70s heavy rock into a perfect musical blend. The killers in a row!

9. Coheed & Cambria: Vaxis III: The Father Of Make Believe – C&C are back with a vengeance! Killer album in the vein of their best album “Good Apollo”. Melodic, proggy, quirky and with great songs! 

10. Armellino: Heritage Blend – Outstanding classic 70s sounding French hard rocker! Bluesy hard rock with swagger!

Honrable mentions:

Anthony Gomes: Praise The Loud – Current kick azz blues rocker with riffs that rock and a voice laced with barb wire! 

Arkado: Open Sea – A solid melodic hard rocker well worth an honorary mention. A stellar heavy AOR rocker with high class vocals and musical delivery. Solid song writing and great production, too!

Angeline: Rhythm Of One – With a load of albums under their belt these Swedish melodic hard rockers continue to deliver high-class guitar driven melodic rock. 

Harem Scarem: Chasing Euphoria – These Canadian melodic rockers are more of an institution by now. Can’t say they’ve ever released a bad album, even if there are some I like more than others. “Chasing Euphoria” is still another solid melodic rock release from the band. 

MoonDog: Time Is The Fire - Solid Danish hard rocker with a 70s touch!

INGLORIOUS – Inglorious (CD)

Wow!!! Just f***ing WOW!!! I’ve seen there’s been a bit of a hype around this band and before hearing them I was not really paying attention thinking it was just one more, no offence, decent but not overly exciting melodic rock project. Well, suck me sideways! Wrong was I!! I damn near stood in attention after the sneaky intro had finished and the first riffs of opening track Until I Die rolled out of the speakers like a raging steamroller! The first band that came to mind was the long lost Badlands fronted by the highly missed Ray Gillen. The power, the riff and the intensity of phenomenal power house vocalist Nathan James just hit me like a brick! One track doesn’t do an album, of course, which second track Breakaway helps to overcome. This one started out with a touch of Aussie rockers Electric Mary with a Whitesnake sounding chorus. High Flying Gypsy provides a bit of Kashmir-feel to the guitar rhythm, but there end the similarities. Another killer bluesy rocker. Holy Water starts out with a cool bluesy riff, the pumping bass and drums come in and we’re now in Whitesnake meets Purple territory, with Nathan hitting that soul-rattling Hughes vibe. A big, powerful, yet cool and bluesy ballad. A dirty, mean, gritty, ugly and lonely guitar starts off the track Warning, joined by a cool slide guitar. Break. Hell breaks loose! Inglorious may not be bastards, but they sure sound like a bunch of bad boys! Bleed For You also enters into a cool, bluesy Whitesnakey vibe, but better than anything that band has done since 1984. Ok, Girl Got Gun is yet another slow piece. It’s a great track, but I hope you’re not falling asleep, guys, are you? Well, You’re Mine answers the question. Nope! The track Inglorious sticks out a bit with it’s simple halftone descent metallic riff, followed by a Magnum-like passage, making me wonder where this one’s heading. It’s a bit like if Led Zeppelin and Magnum had a love child, and that’s all good in my book! Unaware starts off with a soft piano intro, after which the heavy riff masters take over and turns this into a heavy, yet cool riff-oriented hard rocker with a modern melodic rock chorus. Some bluesy 7-chords, a bit of wah and we’re home free! Even though the album closer is entitled Wake, I think Goodnight would be more appropriate. Acoustic guitars and vocals and then 3 minutes into the song some very unplugged sounding drums and a bluesy guitar solo enter. Kind of a Badlands-vibe to this one as well, actually. This will most likely be the cigarette lighter (now iPhone) moment of the glorious Inglorious live show. Damn fine album, indeed!

Janne Stark

Label: Frontiers

Country: UK

Year: 2016

Video: https://youtu.be/SJTdvTfEFGc