“Second Time Around” is the latest album from Mike Tramp and it was released on 1st May by Target Records. This is his twelfth solo album and the seventh in the last decade as he continues what seems to be a constant cycle of writing, recording and touring. Long may it continue! I had pre-ordered the album in red vinyl. The track “Between Good and Bad” was included on the Friday NI Rocks Show on 27th March and “The Road” followed on 24th April.


 

Mike Tramp of course shot to fame with White Lion in the 80’s, releasing four studio albums with the band between 1985 and 1991. He went on to form Freak of Nature and released two studio albums with that band before going on to release his first solo album, “Capricorn”, in 1997. After a five year gap, he released a further three solo albums in as many years, before returning with a new White Lion line-up that ultimately released “Return of the Pride” in 2008. The next album release was the ‘solo’ album “The Rock n Roll Circuz” which was named after his solo band and was initially apparently to be another White Lion album. The 2011 release “Stand Your Ground” also featured The Rock N Roll Circuz band.


I recorded an interview with Mike in 2015 following the release of the final part of a trilogy of albums released a year apart – “Cobblestone Street”, “Museum” and “Nomad” - http://www.rockradioni.co.uk/interviews/2195-ni-rocks-interview-with-mike-tramp.html. Those albums were followed by “Maybe Tomorrow” in 2017 and “Stray From The Flock” in 2019.


“Second Time Around” is a collection of songs that have been around for a while. I’ve used some extracts from the press release to best explain –

“I remember writing the first song “When She Cries”, October 2, 2005, the day after my daughter Isabel had been born. It was like a whole new door opened and all these songs came out over the next few months along with a whole other bunch of songs, which have all ended up on different albums. You can say it was the most creative time in my 44 years in the rock ’n ’roll uniform.

The songs on “Second Time Around” are some of my favourite compositions, and for many years I have gone around with a feeling that they were never given a real chance. I have missed them in my live shows and I have missed singing them. So when I made the decision to rebuild and resurrect this bunch of songs, with the help of my trusted brothers in rock ’n’ roll who have all been a part of my last seven solo albums in different ways, it was truly a chance to go for a “Second Time Around”, and this time I grabbed it, clear in my mind and focused like never before. A great moment of embracing that the songs I have written always clearly express who Mike Tramp is.

I am proud of these songs. They are like my other albums and 100% representation of who Mike Tramp is. If aliens came down to earth and happened to pick up “Second Time Around” as the first Mike Tramp album they heard, I would be truly proud and confident that all of my DNA, would be in this album"


The album features Mike Tramp on vocals and guitar, Claus Langeskov on guitar, Morten Hellborn on bass, Oliver Steffensen on piano and long-time co-producer and co-writer Soren Andersen on drums.



About “NI Rocks Recommends”

This is purely a personal recommendation and some information about the artist and the album; not a traditional ‘review’. Most of the recommendations posted are for albums that have been sent to us digitally by the record label or promoter. Quite often I’ve also bought the album on CD or vinyl as well and sometimes I just feel the need to post a recommendation for an album that I’ve bought myself. Essentially these are albums that I like and which I’ve played some tracks from on the Shows on Rock Radio NI!