6035 - Screaming BLUE MURDER - Dedicated To Phil Lynott (1994)

BLUE MURDER
''SCREAMING: DEDICATED TO PHIL LYNOTT''
MAY 26 1994
60:23

1/Riot/7:16
2/Cry For Love/7:53
3/Cold Sweat/Sykes, Phil Lynott/3:26
4/Billy/6:45
5/Save My Love/3:36
6/Jelly Roll/4:51
7/We All Fall Down/5:24
8/Please Don't Leave Me/Lynott, Sykes/7:27
9/Still of the Night/David Coverdale, Sykes/8:48
10/Dancing in the Moonlight (It's Caught Me in Its Spotlight)/Lynott/4:39
Tracks By John Sykes, Except Where Indicated

John Sykes/Lead Vocals, Guitar
Marco Mendoza/Bass, Backing Vocals
Tommy O'Steen/Drums
Nik Green/Keyboards

Screaming Blue Murder: Dedicated to Phil Lynott is a live album released by the English heavy metal band, Blue Murder. It is the band's third and final release, and was initially issued only in Japan. It has since been re-released via iTunes.

BIOGRAPHY
by John Book
Blue Murder features Carmine Appice on drums, John Sykes of Whitesnake fame on guitar, and Tony Franklin, who played with The Firm, on bass. Great supergroup playing some heavy riffs and nice, blues-influenced hard rock. Melodic but not too soft.

6034 - BLUE MURDER - Nothin' But Trouble (1993)

BLUE MURDER
''NOTHIN' BUT TROUBLE''
1993
55:28

1 /We All Fall Down
John Sykes/4:47
2 /Itchycoo Park
Ronnie Lane/3:46
3 /Cry for Love
John Sykes/6:57
4 /Runaway
John Sykes/5:58
5 /Dance
John Sykes/4:08
6 /I'm on Fire
John Sykes/4:45
7 /Save My Love
John Sykes/4:48
8 /Love Child
John Sykes/5:29
9 /Shouldn't Have Let You Go
John Sykes/4:10
10 /I Need an Angel
John Sykes/7:02
11 /She Knows
John Sykes/3:38

Carmine Appice /Drums
Tony Franklin /Bass
Nik Green /Keyboards
John Kalodner
Kelly Keeling /Vocals, Vocals (Background)
Marco Mendoza /Guitar (Bass)
Tommy O'Steen /Drums, Vocals (Background)
Jim Sitterly /Violin
John Sykes /Arranger, Guitar, Vocals

BIOGRAPHY
by John Book
Blue Murder features Carmine Appice on drums, John Sykes of Whitesnake fame on guitar, and Tony Franklin, who played with The Firm, on bass. Great supergroup playing some heavy riffs and nice, blues-influenced hard rock. Melodic but not too soft.

5988 - BLUE MURDER (1989)

BLUE MURDER
''BLUE MURDER''
APRIL 1989
52:04

1 /Riot
Mader / John Sykes/6:21
2 /Sex Child
John Sykes/5:59
3 /Valley of the Kings
John Sykes/7:51
4 /Jelly Roll
John Sykes/4:44
5 /Blue Murder
Carmine Appice / Tony Franklin / John Sykes/4:55
6 /Out of Love
John Sykes/6:44
7 /Billy
John Sykes/4:11
8 /Ptolemy
John Sykes/6:29
9 /Black-Hearted Woman
Carmine Appice / Tony Franklin / John Sykes/4:47

Carmine Appice /Drums, Vocals, Vocals (Background)
Tony Franklin /Bass, Guitar (Bass), Vocals, Vocals (Background)
Nik Green /Keyboards
Marc LaFrance /Vocals, Vocals (Background)
David Steele /Vocals, Vocals (Background)
John Sykes /Guitar, Vocals, Vocals (Background)
John Webster /Keyboard Programming, Keyboards

REVIEW
by Eduardo Rivadavia
After helping singer David Coverdale reinvent Whitesnake both sonically and aesthetically for the image-conscious American market, guitar hero John Sykes acrimoniously left the group when it became apparent that there was only room enough for one overblown ego in it: Coverdale's. Hardly ones to let a good thing slip away, though, the executives at Whitesnake's label, Geffen Records (specifically A&R super-guru John Kalodner), immediately signed Sykes to a new development deal and proceeded to aid and abet him in founding his own supergroup, Blue Murder, with veteran bassist Tony Franklin and nearly geriatric drummer Carmine Appice (whose career probably started before Sykes was even born!). Released in 1989, the power trio's eponymous debut was produced to pompous perfection by none other than Bob Rock, whose golden ears for bombastic yet consumer-friendly '80s metal were truly second to none at the time -- other than the one and only Mutt Lange, of course. And perhaps more than any of Rock's jobs prior to his hook-up with Metallica, Blue Murder proves it, thanks to songs ranging from muscular power-chord hell-fests like "Riot" and "Blue Murder"; to blues-inflected fare like "Jelly Roll" (whose video was soon all over MTV); to the all-important, overly lush (and frankly not all that good) power ballad "Out of Love." But the album has also become rather dated over the years, because of its frequent indulgence in the same sort of unchecked, peroxide-fueled "Bad Zeppelin-isms" that were then being shamelessly appropriated by bands like Kingdom Come and Sykes' own former boss, David Coverdale, and the reborn Whitesnake. As such, prime offenders like the gratuitously preening "Sex Child," the impressively epic "Valley of the Kings," and the disappointingly tepid "Ptolemy" abused this ethically flawed (if unquestionably effective, from a sales standpoint) gimmick at its most grotesquely histrionic -- but no more so than any of the other groups cited above, really. And because Blue Murder's songwriting was relatively consistent and their musicianship beyond reproach throughout, it's easy to understand why this album has endured far better than most similarly styled heavy metal albums of the era.