Description

Bjorn Stigsson is a Swedish guitarist, songwriter and producer who in the 80s worked with the hard rock group Leviticus. In the USA, he worked for a short time with Dino and John Elefante. His first solo album was released in 1987 and it was called Together With Friends. One of the singers that lent his voice to this recording was Motherlode vocalist Sonny Larsson. This was a lasting friendship and in 1991 the duo temaed up again to create the band XT. XT released three albums in the first half of the 90s (Self titled album 1992, Tax Free 1993 and Extended Empire 1995) before calling it a day and working on other things. In 2017, the band reformed as a quintet with the three Jerusalem musicians Peter Carlsohn (b), Dan Tibell (k) and Mick Nordström (d) and returned with the comeback album Saved By The Blood. Every XT album has brought in something new and sounded a bit different. Saved By the Blood is no different. This album sounds more musically adult, more seated. The songs are less hectic, Larsson screechs less cutting, Stigsson’s guitar is less aggressive, and Tibell’s Hammond Orgel fills wide spaces. As a result, the album is located somewhere between rock and metal with a significant impact of the seventies. The rather slow rammer Watchman with plucked intro is daring as an opener. Although the reef is thrilling, the vocals go down a bit in the mix at the beginning. But the solo sounds nice like Gilmour, you could have liked to play it even longer. Then follows the best section of the album with four successful tracks – one of them the obligatory ballad, the others rock. The album concludes with three thematically related pieces about Christ’s Last Supper, His Crucifixion and Resurrection. Overall a solid album where we can enjoy Stigsson’s emotional solos and Tibell’s wonderful Hammond sound.

Track list:
1. Watchman
2. The One
3. I Will Follow You
4. All Of Your Love
5. What’s Going On
6. The Last Supper
7. The Crucifixion
8. The Resurrection