Brother's Keeper

Brother's Keeper is the comeback record, drawing wistful melodic hard rock with soft keyboards, fluid guitar and Tommy Heart's soaring singing. About five years after the 2000 hiatus, they restarted in 2005. Andy Malecek did not return, leaving a four-piece of Heart, Helge Engelke, Ule W. Ritgen and C.C. Behrens. It was recorded at a friend's villa. During the gap, Engelke and Behrens worked in Dreamtide and Heart in Soul Doctor. Rather than pushing through with flash, the songs draw you in with the rise and fall of melody and the warmth of the ensemble. From the lift of the advance single “Don't Keep Me Waiting” to “Push Me On,” “The Cry” and “All I Wanna Do,” it never slackens across more than seventy minutes. Down to a single guitar, the texture leans, if anything, refreshingly toward straight hard rock. Ballad-like afterglow and hard rock drive cross naturally, with an accomplishment that makes the long silence disappear. Highly rated in BURRN! too — a record fitting for a fresh start, with mature playing and undiminished melodic sense.