As requested, here’s “Love ‘N’ Crime“, the terrific one and only album by Australian rockers ICE TIGER. Formed in 1987 by virtuoso electric guitar player Graham Greene, ICE TIGER became the most enormously popular & successful Melodic Hard Rock band from Perth, and one of the biggest in Australia until disbanded 1992.
After working as guitarist for Flash Harry for five years, Greene was looking for a fresh rock n’ roll sound. At that time, there were no bands of any note in Perth that were playing the L.A. glam rock stuff that was starting to get on the airwaves – Bon Jovi, Def Leppard, Whitesnake, et all – and Greene thought it would be fun to play.
Ice Tiger was originally intended to be a way to get out on the weekend, play some tunes and make a few dollars. It took them 24 hours – the time between their first Perth gig and the second – to become one of the biggest names on the local scene. It was a bit of a surprise, but a pleasant one.
The band recorded and released a couple of cassettes that sold out soon, and a few international artists had seen the ICE TIGER and praised their songs & sound. Gregg Bissonnette (David Lee Roth’s drummer at the time) even got up with them to jam. But ICE TIGER were comfortable in Perth, playing big rooms to big crowds, making a reasonable living, starting families – and they didn’t had the wish to try some luck in L.A.
Anyway, Greene wanted to make a proper album with ICE TIGER, and as the perfectionist he is, do it properly or not at all. It took two years to finish, but the results were excellent for an indie. This is ballsy but extremely polished ’80s melodic hard rock, with blazing guitars, huge classic vocals and lots of stabbing keyboards.
“Love ‘N’ Crime” sold very well in Australia, and resulted highly requested as import in Japan, Europe, Scandinavia, UK, as well as America. Later, with ICE TIGER already disbanded, the CD was reissued in Europe by Long Island Records.
Songs like upbeat rockers ‘Turn To Fantasy’, ‘Little Runaway’, ‘Paradise’, the atmospheric AOR of ‘Running For Cover’, the strong ballad ‘All I Need Is A Friend’, and melodic rockers ‘Lonely Heart’ and ‘Castaway’ makes this album a much needed listen for fans of the genre.
While Graham Greene pursued a solo career still successful to this present day – not exactly a household name but he’s not called ‘The Satriani Of the South’ in Australia for nothing – from time to time they do some ICE TIGER reunion shows. A band that didn’t care about fame and fortune in L.A., but as songwriters & performers were on par in quality to the best Californian-based acts from the late ’80s.
Highly Recommended
01 - Don't Say.
02 - Turn To Fantasy.
03 - All I Need Is A Friend.
04 - Lonely Heart.
05 - Castaway.
06 - Lovin Crime.
07 - Paradise.
08 - Running For Cover.
09 - Uttle Runaway.
10 - Newer Let Me Go.
Dave Crosby – Lead/Backing Vocals,
Don Benson – Bass, Backing Vocals,
Graham Greene – Guitar, Keyboards, Backing Vocals,
John Calabrese – Keyboards,
Steve Essex – Drums, Backing Vocals
Ice Tiger – Love’n’Crime (1991), MP3+FLAC
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