The first time I came across Shiraz Lane was at South Park Festival in Tampere, Finland in 2016. This was a few months after the release of the band’s first album For Crying Out Loud. Since then, I have been looking forward to the next album!

Today, February 23, 2018, marked the release of their second album, Carnival Days.

At the first listen, the album already seemed more mature than the previous one. They have further developed their own sound and produced an album that on the one hand shows the typical Shiraz Lane style and on the other hand plays with many other styles of music.

The first track has unusual sounds in the beginning, you can hear a saxophone there. Saxophone and Hard Rock? Does not fit? But it fits. ‘Carnival Days‘ is absolutely convincing as an opener.

The Crown‘, ‘People Like Us‘ and ‘Harder to Breathe‘ were already available as single releases and in my opinion, they were just the right appetizers. Quieter songs like ‘Gotta Be Real‘ and ‘Shangri-La‘ offer just as much as the harder, back-to-the-roots Hard Rock songs ‘War of Mine‘ and ‘Shots of Life‘.

The last song of the album, ‘Reincarnation‘, starts slowly and keeps pushing forward. The album wins me over, above all, because of the combination of Hannes Kett‘s extensive voice, the melodic guitar riffs and groovy rhythm.