McOil - 1979 - All Our Hopes

McOil

1979

All Our Hopes

01. Be Careful 4:12
02. All Our Hopes 9:28
03. This Time Should Never End 6:34
04. Mask Of Life 5:00
05. Sailing Around 5:57
06. Once In The Summernight 4:00
07. What's This Live 5:58

Bass – Norbert Kuhpfahl
Drums – Andy Tischmann
Guitar, Backing Vocals – Karl Wild
Keyboards, Vocals – Walter Utz

Recorded at EGE-SOUND-STUDIO Aug./ Sept. 1979.
Mixed by Dieter Ege Okt. 1979.

McOil's only album is a keyboard driven heavy prog LP with lots of strong guitarwork. The vocalist doesn't convince me but the material is still pretty enjoyable. While this record is mostly a progressive rock album it also includes lots of hard rock elements and also some heavy metal influences can be heard here and there. 

I find the B-side to be the better side here. The first side is pretty decent but the second side is definitely a good one. "Sailing Around" and "What's This Life" are my favourite songs on this record. I would rate this album with 3,25 stars if I could. If you dig keyboard/organ driven hard rock bands such as Deep Purple or Uriah Heep you should give a try to McOil as well. The album was originally released as a private pressing and it hasn't been reissued on vinyl yet..

McOil were a late 70s heavy progressive rock group from southern Germany with only a 7" single and the album 'All Our Hopes' (CD 004, 1979) to their credit. The foursome developed a full-bodied sound on the back of Karl Wild's hearty mid-tone guitar riffs (think Boston). Keyboardist Walter Litz also served as the band's vocalist, sounding gruff and powerful like Graham Bonnet (ex-Rainbow). The title track is your standard epic progressive multi-part suite, but I can't slag it off as it's pretty well done. Next, they turn around with the very heavy and psychedelic "This Time Should Never End," and now I'm sold on McOil as a winner (even with the drum solo...not so bad, really!). If the band had been from England instead, they almost certainly would've been lumped in with the NWOBHM (rightly or wrongly), and considered one of the better ones I imagine. And rightly so...McOil might not have been a trend-setter in Germany, but they produced some really intelligent heavy rock. Well, the 'intelligence' of the hard-rock polka that introduces the bonus track "A Better Day" (the B-side to the 1978 single) is debatable, but that's an exception! 

The most represented band on the GoD label with three CDs to date, Arktis' self-titled debut (CD 005) recorded in 1973 appeared first. Often along the lines of Captain Beyond, Arktis wrote heavy blues rock tunes with a psychedelic slant colored by Karin Töppig's potent voice. The first two of the four album tracks are more in the standard classic rock style, but are interesting works nonetheless. "Jeff the Fool" shows off more psychedelic tendencies in a short form (just 3 1/2 minutes) with even a hint of Amon Düül II's weirdness. In contrast, the album's finale "Rare Girl" clocks in at 20 minutes, their answer to "In-a-Gadda-da-Vida." Following the initial 'song riff' and Töppig's gritty vocals and then a loose bluesy jam, the freaked-out portion then kicks in about half-way and carries us on through to the song's final reprisal. Personally, I found their strength to be in their structured works as their jams were somewhat tentative, although that tendency seemed to reverse by the next album. Three bonus tracks are tacked onto the end to fill 45 minutes, all recorded by Conny Plank in 1974 for an intended second that never materialized in the end. The latter two are unspectacular, but "Is it Real?" is a cool uptempo swirly number, even though the title phrase sounds more like "It's a Drill!!" given the heavy accent. All in all, my favorite of Arktis' three works on GoD........By Keith Henderson......Garden of Delights.........~ 

Nice hard-edged krautrock. Not a masterpiece, but very enjoyable album that is definitely worth finding. I like Karl Wild's rough vocal delivery unlike many other reviewers. Some moments here remind me of early 1970's Scorpions albums, but overall this one much more progressive. It's a great release, especially for the 1979, when most other prog bands were making awful commercial crap trying to "catch-up" with punk and new-wave.....by......faust3d ....

Looks to be the obscure German -heavy progressive- band's lp - initially released in 1979. Tunes that definitely (sort of) caught me off guard were the adventurous title track "All Our Hopes", the eight-minute "This Time Should Never End", the rocking "Mask Of Life", "Sailing Around" (good harmony vocals) and "Once In The Summernight". Added as a bonus cut - the so-so "A Better Day" notably was the B-side to the band's 7" single. Line-up: Karl Wild - guitar & backing vocals, Walter Utz - keyboards & vocals, Norbert Kuhpfahl - bass and Andy Tischmann - drums. I see that this lp was produced by Dieter Ege (who's also worked with Anyone's Daughter, Ghosttrain, Krann among others). Might possibly pull in fans of Eloy, Jane and Gift.