Ace Frehley: Spaceman

Kicking thing off with ‘Without You I’m Nothing’, Ace instantly shows he’s not a spent force with an upbeat rocking track, great riffing and some catchy, relaxed vocals. It continues on with ‘Rockin with the Boys!’, which is similar, but has a more anthemic chorus, and some classic Ace leadwork. Something about the chorus didn’t resonate with me, but aside from that, this is some solid rock indeed, and as you would expect, it has the regular Kiss flashback, which is never a bad thing.
‘Your Wish is my Command’ and ‘Bronx Boy’ and so on are a further testament to how much influence Ace really had on Kiss’ sound and style back in the 70’s. How it stacks up in this
day and age is not clear cut, but fuck it, good music is good music, and this sounds more like Kiss than anything else I have heard Ace do in a long, long time so I’m just going to enjoy it… OK?
His voice has held up better than expected over the years, and it makes the ‘middle of the road’ lyrics a lot better than could have been the case. I’m craving just that bit more lead though, that bit more swagger, but this is about as good as I would expect at this stage in Ace’s career.
‘Mission To Mars’ elevated my interest as it was wavering. Ace pulls off the 90’s punk/rock/grunge surprisingly well and is one of the stand-out tracks. However the last two tracks just don’t cut it like a majority of the first seven tracks, and bring this one just below the 4 shaka mark.
3.5/5 Shakas
eOne
Reviewed by Glenn Lynch