After only a few listens to Buckcherry's all-new eighteen (yeah that's 18) track album I'm starting to think they are becoming a bit of a band of two halves. When Buckcherry are great they are simply amazing, but when they are not, well they are... quite average. 

But wait a minute let's not get ahead of ourselves here.

Following hot on the heels of the some might say lacklustre 'Black Butterfly' album and their raw as fuck 'Live And Loud' set from last year, album number five 'All Night Long' arrived on the ÜRHQ doormat housed in a sleeve that harks back to the band's classic debut album, so immediately this old buck was frothing at the mouth at the prospect of the band once again firing on all cylinders in the studio. 

If the production on this album courtesy of Keith Neilson and Marti Frederiksen is anything to go by then the Bastard Ranch where it was recorded must have had a nine-mile exclusion zone around it as everything is loud and I mean LOUD!

Lead track and first single 'All Night Long' high kicks things off with a swagger that is immediately identifiable as Buckcherry, not exactly classic stuff but certainly a great mood setter. Next up is the band's anthem in waiting 'It's A Party', which manages to wrap 'We Will Rock You' and 'Paradise City' up in 3 minutes 43 seconds of total glam pop fun. If 'Oh My Lord' had actually followed this track (it doesn't, the two tracks are split by the first slowie 'These Things') I'd probably be writing this raving on about this being the best set of tunes the band have penned since 'Time Bomb'. But as it plays out this is the first time I actually find myself skipping a track, you see 'These Things' isn't bad it's just that 'Oh My Lord' is sassy, dirty and catchy as fuck and is exactly why I fell in love with Buckcherry in the first place, it's the type of tune I can get a musical boner over.

Then, steaming through no questions asked, you have the brutal mind fuck of 'Recovery', and when 'Never Say Never ' follows I'm thinking that the best set of songs since.... quote must just get a look in after all.  But then slowie number two 'I Want You' comes along and the boner is starting to wilt, only a bit mind you, but enough for me to need the musical viagra that is the Black Crowes tinted 'Liberty' complete with its mean slide guitar.

With the regular edition of 'All Night Long' entering its final three songs 'Our World' has an offbeat stuttering drum riff that drives a seventies sounding chorus into instant chart hit territory.  'Bliss' meanwhile continues the album's slowie tradition of being a good song but maybe not a great one, before the album wraps up with the 'almost' heavy metal guitar fest known simply as 'Dead'. The guitar interplay towards the end of this track sounding like the classic duels bands such as Lynyrd Skynyrd and Molly Hatchet had at their peak. And so with a rather abrupt command of "Suck It" from motor mouth Josh Todd, 'All Night Long' draws to a fitting conclusion. That is unless you possess the eighteen-track version of 'All Night Long' I mentioned at the start of this review, which brings you an extra seven tracks in the shape of the 'Restless Sons' acoustic EP. 

For me this extra crop of acoustic tracks is just a step too far, and every time I get to the intro of the acoustic version of 'These Things' that heads up this segment I keep finding myself skipping back to track one and starting my musical roller coaster ride all over again.

The trouble is every time I get a new Buckcherry album I expect 11 songs as exciting as 'Frontside', 'Dead Again' and 'Next 2 You' to make my tail pop out. 'All Night Long' is just a bit of a tail tease.

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