Rock Nation Italy - 'Ambush (2020 Reissue)' Review by Andrea Bartolini

Talking about Tygers Of Pan Tang means talking about the New Wave Of British Heavy Metal, through the pages of a band that has been among the protagonists of this movement since the very beginning. Coming from Withley Bay, England, the band has gone through various phases and from 1978 - the year of its foundation - to today has gone through various line ups, breakups and reforms, experiencing both the limelight and the darkness of anonymity. There is no doubt that the entry of the current singer Jacopo "Jack" Meille, now dating back to 2004, has marked the beginning of a new course for the band, whose core is formed by the founder Robb Weir and the drummer Craig Ellis has been leading the band since 2000, when Tygers Of pan Tang got back on track.

In this 2020 lack of Rock played live and in a particular moment for the Tygers, have had to face the defection of guitarist Michael Crystal, comes the reissue of "Ambush", album originally released in 2012, the second album with Meille on vocals and the first with Gav Gray on bass. This album also marked some goodbyes, that of Dean Robertson who will leave the band the following year and is the last album of the band with the historic producer Chris Tsangarides, who passed away in 2018, already producer of the first two historic Tygers albums and here again in command for this excellent “Ambush”.

The album was remastered at Medley Studios in Copenhagen and will be released on September 18 in a variety of formats; four bonus tracks enrich this edition: an unreleased track from the "Cruel Hands Of Time" sessions plus three more of the songs contained in the album, two in live version and one in demo version.

At the time this album marked a big step forward compared to the previous 2008 "Animal Instinct", both in terms of sound and production and writing, and the class and taste that permeate all the work, perfectly mixing old attitudes and new impulses make it their best record of the last 20 years along with the subsequent 2016 “Tygers Of pan Tang”. The kind of class that allows a riff, like that of the initial "Keeping Me Alive" (one of Robb's best) to immediately identify the band but also to perfectly coexist with the dynamic airplay of a "Man On Fire", or with the alternative vibes of "Rock'n'Roll Dream". And if the band can afford to cite itself at the end of the excellent and pressing "Hey Suzie" it is because when it wants to write great rock pieces, escaping the usual clichés to which a band of this genre is thought to be subject, as precisely in " One Of A Kind ".

Highly recommended for young fans who do not know Tygers Of Pan Tang, in case they exist, or for longtime fans who may have stuck to old classic works, this reissue of “Ambush” represents an excellent starting point for both.

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