Simon RushworthHarsh — Feels (Fireflash Reecords/Edel)
Paris.
Home to world class art, high fashion, fine dining and…hair metal.
Harsh might be more Champs-Élysées than Sunset Strip but these students of 80s pop rock know their onions.
Just like Brie, Camembert, Roquefort and more, Feels is as cheesy — and sleazy — as it comes.
But that’s no criticism of a record that’s happily in thrall to the heroes of late 80s West Hollywood.
In fact, Albert Arnold (lead vocals/guitar), Séverin Piozzoli (guitar/backing vocals), Julien Martin (bass/backing vocals) and Léo Löwenthal (drums/backing vocals) nail the genre. And then some.
Listen to Feels and you’ll hear LA Guns, Ratt, White Lion and Dokken.
There are funky turns and AOR twists.
And you’ll find polished vocal harmonies, soaring solos and festival-ready choruses.
Arnold can give any of Scandinavia’s retro-styled frontmen a run for their money.
It seems Piozzoli’s been schooled in peak Nuno Bettencourt.
Martin and Löwenthal, meanwhile, might just be the most dynamic rhythm section since Billy Sheehan and Pat Torpey.
Feels as good as it sounds? Mais oui.
Feels so good
Harsh critics?
After we caught Arnold and co. at 2025’s Call Of The Wild Festival we couldn’t wait to wax lyrical about French metal’s Fab Four.
And Feels has been a long time coming for those who caught a glimpse of the future in Lincoln 12 months ago.
This 12-track tour de force comfortably eclipses 2022’s Out Of Control.
That promising debut was no bad record, by the way.
But Feels represents a real touch of class from a band that’s nailed its identity.
Offer You A Rome could be a Paul Laine-era Danger Danger classic.
Don’t Mess With Me is like something Warrant or Bulletboys might have written back in the day.
Then there’s acoustic-led ballad Forever Yesterday — a triumphant Bon Jovi-meets-Tesla trip down memory lane.
Maniac’s Hysteria/Whitesnake 1987 mash-up of an intro breathes new life into the iconic Flashdance anthem.
And as for the axe work underpinning anthemic set closer When We’re Together? Take a bow, Séverin Piozzoli.
Throwback hair metal? More like Gallic flair metal.
