Night Ranger had secured opening act positions with both ZZ Top and Ozzy Osbourne (with Brad Gillis filling in on lead guitar for Ozzy for the recently deceased Randy Rhoads) and were in the process of promoting this soon-to-be-released album. As a band they were in a position that gave them a strength when it came to writing and performing. The band contained two main songwriters in Blades and Keagy, both of whom also swapped and shared lead vocals for the tracks. The resulting mix gave the songs on the album a different focus depending on who the main writer of the song was and who was the main vocalist on the track. And this mix was also complemented by the ability of the band to not only write a great hard rock track, but also a popular rock ballad as well. Their sound was more commercial than contemporaries Y&T which enabled them to corner both ends of the market when it came to their target audience.
For a debut album, this crosses a line between several distinct genre possibilities, depending on just what your music preferences are. Looking back at it from such a long distance in the past, there’s little doubt that while it isn’t AOR or easy listening in the way that many 1970’s rock bands generated, it has its roots there from the band’s formative years. That base then incorporates a harder rock sound that bands like Kiss had utilised at the time, while also integrating the kind of rock ballad basis that was utilised in order to get airplay on radio stations worldwide in that era.
And Night Ranger had a terrific formation to accomplish all of those things. With twin guitars, and two players who both wanted to showcase their skills on their instrument, meant that duelling solos and harmonising gave their hard rock songs exactly what they needed to appeal to that market – the market I was a part of. Then they also had the great crooning vocals of both Blades and Keagy, with more injection of the synth and the rock ballad guitar that emphasised those tracks in the direction they wanted them to go in order to appeal to that market.
And the ballad tracks certainly work in that favour. “Sing Me Away” and “Young Girl in Love” are written by both Blades and Keagy, in the tradition of rock ballads, with both sung by Keagy who appears to be the main vocalist on these types of tracks. And they do the job the band is looking for well, and given they are spaced between the rockier songs the album holds itself together well, whether they are your kind of songs or not. In between these tracks come songs such as “At Night She Sleeps” and “Call My Name” and “Eddie’s Coming Out Tonight” which find the nice middle ground, good solid rock songs that play their part in making the foundation of the album.
All of these combine with what, for me at least, are the starring songs here. “Play Rough” is a tough talking track, “Penny” is perhaps the second best guitar track on the album with both Gillis and Watson freeforming across the song and Kelly Keagy belting out the lyrics. And “Can’t Find Me A Thrill” has both vocalists singing and trading vocals which is terrific. They are bookended by two great songs in the title track “Night Ranger” that closes out the album, and the opening track “Don’t Tell Me You Love Me”, with the great opening riff and drum beat, Blades great vocals and the scorching guitars. It’s the song that pulled me headlong into this band.
At times during my life with music there have come along albums that I have gained an obsession with, healthy or unhealthy. Just every so often one would crop up, and I wouldn’t stop listening to it for, not just weeks or months, but even into years. “Dawn Patrol” was one of these. In 1986 we had an American exchange student turn up in our year for a few short weeks. With him he brought his current listening material. One of the bands that he had albums of was Night Ranger, and this album was the one I heard first. And was the one that grabbed me. And it was from that opening track, from Brad Gillis’s opening guitar twiddle, the combining of Kelly Keagy’s drum beat, and into the song. It was the lure that grabbed me and dragged me in. And then everything that followed felt perfect. A great combination of the hard rock and the rock ballad, awesome guitars – just awesome throughout really – from Brad Gillis and Jeff Watson, the great atmospheric keys from Alan Fitzgerald which don’t overpower but add in each song, Kelly Keagy’s brilliant drumming along with his vocals, and the dominating bass lines and also vocals from Jack Blades.
I had this album on a C90 cassette with the band’s second album “7 Wishes” on the other side, and it stayed in my car cassette player (once I got my licence, which probably wasn’t until about nine months after I got this album) and at home for longer than I can remember. It did eventually die a violent, chewed up, irretrievably lost death from overplaying, which should give you an idea of how much I played it. And it has always been a favourite as a result. Indeed, all of Night Ranger’s first four albums are favourites, but this one has always had a special place. And in many ways I still surprise people when I sing songs off it, because they don’t even know who Night Ranger are. But my kids know that opening track of this album, because I played the video clip to them over and over as they grew up, bouncing them off to sleep on my knee as I serenaded them with one of my favourite songs of all time.
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