644. Riverdogs / Riverdogs. 1990. 3/5

Back in 1990, Vivian Campbell was still my guitaring hero. Despite his falling out and dismissal from Dio, for which his contribution was critical and magnificent, and his subsequent flirtation in the touring band of Whitesnake, he was what I wanted to be had I ever gotten off my backside and learned to play the guitar.
From the time he left Dio, I searched in vain for everytime he was mentioned as having joined another band (Whitesnake was his first stop, no matter that it was a short one). Then, one day in Australia's "Hot Metal" magazine, I discovered it. He had formed a band called Riverdogs, and their debut album was about to be released. So off I trotted to Sydney's Utopia Records and purchased said album.

With all of the above in mind, you must now be of the opinion that I am going to be slightly biased as to the outcome of this album. For the most part this is certainly true. The first thing to glean from this is that Riverdogs is not a metal album, but a comfortable hard rock experience. At the time of its release I was a little disappointed in its content, with the main reason being that I was very much looking for the heavy side of music at that time of my life. Obviously, I was looking for a Dio album with a different singer, and I didn't get that.
Once I got over that initial disappointment, I did give the album a fair listening, and I found that it wasn't as bad as my first impressions allowed. Rob Lamothe's vocals are terrific, and given the passing of 23 years now since this release I find it amazing that he hasn't gone on to bigger things. I guess the onset of grunge at this time may have had a little to do with it.
Viv's guitaring is as great as always. Okay, so there aren't the unique and blistering solos that he did with Dio, but what he does here is still above average.

The songs are, for the most part, driven by Lamothe's vocals and Viv's guitaring. I don't mind admitting that "Whisper" is one of my all-time favourite 'guilty' tracks, one I can play at any time and sing along to at the top of my lungs. I love the feel of "Water From the Moon" as well, it has a great mood and guitar riff and solo, as well as those dulcet vocals again. Other songs such as "Rain, Rain" and "Toy Soldiers" and "Spooky" are my other real favourites from the album.

As I have gotten older, is it really a surprise that I find myself enjoying this album more? Probably not. It has an 'easy listening' kind of vibe to it these days, reminding me of days gone by. In many ways Riverdogs was, and is, a very underrated album. Could this band have gone places had Vivian not moved in to take Steve Clark's place in Def Leppard not long after this album was released? We'll never know, but that doesn't distract from the fact that there are quite a lot of things that are right about this album, and it is very worthwhile checking out, if only for the two main attractions in this band