Flood The Engine - Flood The Engine (2013)

Bill Leverty is best known as the lead guitarist for the band Firehouse. Jimmy Kunes has spent time behind the microphone for both Savoy Brown and Cactus. The two men met nearly thirty years ago and became good friends. One thing they never did, however, was record an album or put a band together… that is, until now!

Leverty/Kunes have teamed up to form the group Flood the Engines and have released their first self-titled album. Leverty has dropped his hair-metal glam-look that he used to strut with ease during his day-gig in exchange for his rockin’ roots, which match Kunes smoky-blues vocals perfectly. The album is a rock-celebration of guitar driven rock and roll, which is something this world desperately need in 2015, in my honest opinion!

The boys recruited bassist Keith Horne and drummer Andre LaBelle to handle the rhythm section, and then they sat back in the studio and cranked it all up. These boys know their rock and roll. The two cover songs included are slightly below radar for most fans, but to the rock nerds out there, they are gems, each crafted perhaps better than the original. The first is a tune by Paul Kossof’s post-Free band Back Street Crawlers, called “All the Girls are Crazy.” Flood the Engine puts even more bluesy rough edges around this already killer tune. The other remake -and this one is just addictive- is a reworking of Gary Wright’s “Love is Alive.” This sucker is better than Gary’s original (which sounds impossible, I know). The boys in the band were inspired by the original, but not afraid to make it their own!

The rest of the tunes are new compositions, and there is not a bad track amongst them. “Lay It All On Me” is a great track with a great riff and killer vocals. Hell, that pretty much describes the entire album. I’m telling ya all (that’s my Kansas accent coming through) that this one is really good.

Don’t assume this music will always be available for us, as the music industry today is not supportive of this type of music. It is up to us, the fans, to keep it alive. Bill and Jimmy will keep making it, but unless they can at least recoup what they spend, we, the fans, will not be able to hear it. What is more rock ‘n’ roll than standing up against The Machine and getting the music we want to hear? Trust me on this one. Give it a shot.

While they didn’t rewrite the rule book or do anything ground-breaking, Flood the Engine is a solid musical effort with great songs, and the last time I checked, that is all that’s needed to make a good album. This is a genuine effort, performed well by guys who love rock and roll as much as the person reading this review.