Death Ride

Blood of the Sun is a Fort Worth, Texas–based rock ‘n’ roll quintet that sounds like it was raised on '70s hard-rock vinyl. Death Ride opens with the heavy-grooving “One More for the Ride,” where fuzzed-out guitar riffs collide with Hammond organ and a soulful singer who ties it all together. The result sounds like a tougher version of The Black Crowes. The title track uses a hard-panned stereo mix that basically puts the listener onstage with the band. But the hard-throttled rhythms and searing hot guitar leads make this song beg to be dropped on a mix alongside Humble Pie, Uriah Heap, and Cactus. There’s a good chance that if you’re not listening to “Edge of the Sky” inside of a customized van (replete with a mini-waterbed and velvet captain’s chairs), you may be doing it wrong. “The Witchin’ Hour” oozes so much Texas heat from its weighty strut that if it turned out that these guys were the illegitimate offspring of ZZ Top, nobody would be surprised.