Blaze Of Glory review: I blame this world for making a good man evil

Wooooooo, I'm baaaaaaaaack!

Miracle – In comparison to Billy Get Your Guns, this track marks the first time we see where the album is really going. There’s no heavy guitar riff; instead a relaxed, almost orchestral interplay between acoustic and electric guitar, accordion and organ usher in the song, instantly establishing an atmosphere far away from the modern day world of typical rock music. Here, the different players really manage to work together to form a complete sound, rather than fighting each other for supremacy. And that sound fits perfectly in with the melody as a whole and lyrics especially to really bring out the poetry of the song: even the guitar solo provided by Jeff Beck doesn’t really take centre stage, but serves to compliment the whole song. Lyrically this is a song about introspection, the world’s relationship with the individual and some philosophical musings; and while Jon isn’t exactly Friedrich Nietzsche, when you think about how virtually every Bon Jovi song prior was about love, sex or partying; you can see how much of a step forwards a lyric like “you say it ain’t fair that a man walks / when a bird can fly / we have to kick the ground / the stars kiss the sky” really is. And in lyrics such as “I’m just one man / that’s all I’ll ever be / I never cared to be everything you wanted from me / I’ve got big plans, so big, any blind man could see / I was standing in the river, now I’m drowning in the sea”, we can see the defiance that would stand out on the next Bon Jovi album. Jon also gets the chance to really show off not just his vocal range but also his control of putting the right vocal performance in the right parts of the song: the build from the beginning of the verses through to the chorus is fantastic. The song may lack some of the power and truly epic quality that some of the other tracks on the album achieve, but it’s a fine way to lead the hardened Bon Jovi fan into such songs.

4/5

Now you're talking about my album, this is the one that got me into Jovi in the first place and was played pretty much on constant repeat until I got Keep The Faith a year or so later. I agree that it's probably the best songwriting Jon has done, and interesting, as obviously it was mostly all his own work - makes you wonder if they should ditch all the other songwriters on a normal Jovi album and go it on their own (Destination Anywhere's pretty good lyrics-wise as well). Don't want to steal Walrus's thunder and talk about every song, however, I do have to say a few things about a few of them....

Blaze Of Glory to me, while not the most powerful song on the album or the best written, was just a defining point for me in my life - 12 years old, watching the end of Young Guns II and suddenly this song blares out - it was like a revelation - and listening to the lyrics "you ask about my conscience, and I offer you my soul, you ask if I'm gonna' be a wise man, when I ask if I'll grow old" - it just spoke to me at a certain point in my life and has remained with me for the last 18 years. To me personally it's the best damn thing Jon has ever done, and probably ever will do.

Santa Fe is obviously the most highly regarded song on the album, and rightly so. Just the opening intro alone conjures up sweeping vistas of a desert wasteland, and lyrics like "the spirits they intoxicate me, I watch them infiltrate my soul, they try to say its too late for me, tell my guns I'm coming home" - are, quite frankly, stunning. Anyone who thinks Jon Bon Jovi is simply a cheesemerchant should listen to this song and then fall to their knees and beg for forgiveness.

Dyin' Ain't Much Of A Livin' is actually right up there with Santa Fe. It has much the same kind of sombre mood, and I think is a brilliant finish to the album. It's ends the whole epic story just perfectly. Not good to listen to when you are actually drunk on Whiskey and depressed though - I can vouch personally on this....lol.

Justice In A Barrel - this is another one of my favourites. The long intro taken from the movie with Lou Diamond Phillips again sets the scene, and is a good hard rocker. Love the lyrics to the entire song.

The album has a few low points for me ... Billy Get Your Guns, Bang A Drum (just not into the whole Hallejuah thing I guess...lol)....but they're still not bad songs, but then Jon and Jovi don't do bad songs (or didn't, there are a few notable exceptions post 00)

Some of the most emotive work Jon has done has been poured into this album - its maybe only a movie soundtrack, but it's pretty much the best one I've ever heard (alongside The Lost Boys).

Can't wait to read the rest of the review.

I love this album and I think that its soo good because much of it is about Jons pain. It is himself he is writing about whilst going through a bad place with the band and music industry. I guess its why I love DA as well. I think with this album he wasn't trying to write a Bon Jovi album. He was "just" writing a soundtrack so could hide behind the character to write what he was really feeling. There was no expectation of what this album had to be so he just wrote honestly.

I still think LH is a damm fine album as well though.


Kat

Nice insights, thanks! Those are probably my favourite four on the album too, along with Blood Money to make a top 5. Although I do like Bang A Drum a lot as well

And I agree that along with Lost Boys it's at the forefront of soundtracks that I know of, and I'd add The Crow and Spirit: Stallion Of The Cimarron to that list ... actually, the Tarzan one is really good as well IMO. I can't think offhand of any film soundtracks that have been as good that have come out in the last few years

Weeeeeell, over seven months after I last posted a song review, I figured I might try to start this back up again, I really enjoyed doing it for the first four albums, so let's see how it goes ...

Blaze Of Glory - "William H. Bonney, you are not a god!" "Why don't you pull the trigger and find out?" The song that the album was created around begins with an apt quote from the film addressing Billy's mortality, or seeming lack of it, a theme that carries the entire song through. Jon is no stranger to creating a cowboy style atmosphere on songs, and certainly wastes no time here: the Wanted-esque blowing wind sound effect and steady bass drum and percussion beat interplaying with the dual acoustic-electric guitar arrangement bringing windswept plains and galloping horses to mind. As the first verse begins, the instrumentation fades down to a quiet synthesised organ, with a hushed Jon beginning the story, telling how the protagonists wakes up after another night sleeping rough, with no idea where he's going, or where he's been. The intro riff briefly kicks back in again before fading back to a restrained acoustic guitar and piano led verse. Throughout the songs verses, which build in a short space of time from Jon's lower register to him really belting the vocals out, detail the protagonists outlook on his life to that point, while the epic chorus details what he would like to tell the world as he dies. The Jeff Beck guitar solo leads into the songs most introspective moment, over a military drumbeat, the protagonist tells his final wish to God: not for forgiveness, but to die like a man. The final chorus ends with Jon, in character, shouting to the world how he's just "a young gun", before fading back down to a final repeat of the intro, with the instruments fading out one by one to leave a lone acoustic guitar line, which then ends as well. It's hard to imagine a song which better captures a simultaneous sense of powerful defiance and world weary introspection. It's quite right that 18 years later it's still being played live. An album - and a career - high point

5/5

Lyrically, Guano City is a masterpiece.

Cheesemerchant - great word.

Love this album (as I do DA), there's a lot of raw emotion running through it, even if Jon is hiding behind the movie/cowboy character. Not a lot I can say that hasn't already been said. Great reviews, Walrus.

Lyrically, I'm a masterpiece

Cheers

Blood Money - A simple, sparse, beautifully engaging song. For two and a half minutes, we're given just an acoustic guitar, a harmonica, an accordion, and - overpowering it all - a lone voice, singing of betrayal by a friend, but with an understanding of that betrayal: that "this ain't about me / and this ain't about you", and that maybe even it's the right thing for the betrayer to do, and maybe in his place the protagonist would have done the same ... again, it seems as the protagonist here is equal parts Jon and Billy The Kid. It could be said that the song is over too quickly, and indeed there was a longer version written (), but it's the sparseness and simplicity of this song which really hit home hard

4+/5

Great review.
I love santa fe and the blaze of glory is a great album!