Black Star Riders released their fourth album, “Another State of Grace”, on 6th September via Nuclear Blast Records. It was released in several formats, including on picture disc, on green vinyl and on gold vinyl as part of a boxset (the option that I went for!). The album is released just ahead of a tour of the UK and Ireland that sees them play shows in Dublin on 16th October and in The Limelight, Belfast on 17th October. The latter is preceded by an acoustic show in HMV Belfast, open to those who bought the album there.


 

The album is the first with the new line up that features Ricky Warwick on lead vocals and guitar, Scott Gorham on lead guitar, Robert Crane on bass, Chad Szeliga on drums and Christian Martucci on lead guitar. Former Hanoi Rocks singer Michael Monroe provides a saxophone solo for the track “Tonight the Moonlight Let Me Down”.


The first two singles, “Another State of Grace” and “Ain’t The End of the World” have been played a few time on the Friday NI Rocks Show and the new single “Tonight the Moonlight Let Me Down” is on the Show this week. There was a special promo interview with Ricky and Scott on the Show last week.


Black Star Riders formed in 2012 following the decision by Scott Gorham not to release any new music under the ‘Thin Lizzy’ name, even though that band continued to perform live. The original members were Warwick, Gorham, Marco Mendoza on bass, Jimmy DeGrasso on drums and Damon Johnson on guitar. The first album “All Hell Breaks Loose” was released in 2013. Crane replaced Mendoza in 2014 and that line-up released the albums “The Killer Instinct” in 2015 and “Heavy Fire” in 2017. Szeliga joined the band just after the release of the third album, whilst Martucci joined in 2019.


Check out the Black Star Riders website - https://www.blackstarriders.com/


 

 

About “NI Rocks Recommends”

The simple idea behind “NI Rocks Recommends” is to acknowledge and promote some of the great music being submitted to Rock Radio NI. The albums that I’ll be recommending are those that you’ll hear me playing tracks from on my shows. I'll not be giving marks or ratings or analyzing the tracks in great detail; just telling you something about the artist and the album. It’s a personal recommendation to go check something out, not a traditional “review”!