House Of Shakira - Reviews for album Best Of Two

Kurt Torster of STRIKTLY FOR KONNISSUER (SFK) wrote:
House Of Shakira – Best Of Two, MTM, 2000
[Similarities: Frontline, Journey, Fair Warning]
As someone who was never fortunate enough to hear this Swedish mob I never really knew what I was missing. Sounding a bit like Perry and company minus keyboards, this is heavy AOR that really gets the blood pumping and is like a Godsend to me. Why? Well, finally something in the genre that actually sounds fresh and original (the Sting meets Journey “Elephant Gun” is exactly the kind of thing AOR needs to remain relevant). Mixing massive and glorious harmonies, huge hooks and riffs and the incredible pipes of Andreas Eklund, those elements help elevate these songs above and beyond all the recycled cloning we’re all getting a little too used to. As the name implies, this a collection of songs from their first two albums, along with three previously unreleased bonus tracks. I’m glad MTM had allowed us to catch up with the band prior to their upcoming “III” release. It’s really hard not to groove along to such big arena cuts as “Method Of Madness” and “Love Was Good” (both from “Lint”) and “Best Of Times” and “The Chance” (both from “On The Verge”) and immediately your ears will notice that these guys have produced something truly special (17 songs and all very good or better). The three unreleased tunes (for those who may have their two discs) are keepers as well with “Susan” almost single-handedly making this set essential on it’s own. SFKers will be in heaven with this CD, and since it’s hit my mailbox it has pushed all other CDs from my listening areas. Obviously influenced by all that great AOR from the 70s and 80s but adding their own spin and touches, this right now tops all other releases and is one more reason why AOR fans will be going broke this year.

Fred Monster at Majestic Magazine wrote: ( http://start.at/majesticmagazine )
House Of Shakira released two albums - Lint and On The Verge - on the now dead and gone BlueStone label. BlueStone’s distribution wasn’t great to say the least so when MTM signed the band they decided to re-release the best songs of House Of Shakira’s first two albums before they would bring out their new release. "For the fans" they put three never before released bonus tracks on the album and called it Best Of Two. Both albums are equally represented with seven songs each. Both albums have their moments and it's hard to tell which one would be my favorite. The fabulous Method Of Madness has stolen my heart. It may have a bit of a simple chorus but the spontaneity of the song makes up for that bigtime. But songs like Who's Lying Now and Best Of Times are those kind of "I can't get them out of my head" type of songs as well. Other tracks like Ghost In Town and Elephant Gun don't do as much for me. On another note House Of Shakira has something with non-western gimmicks. Morning Over Morocco opens with them and during Elephant Gun, Antelope and - to a lesser extent - The Song Remains you can find them again. Doing something like that once can add to your originality, doing it twice well… but three times may just be too much of a good thing, let alone four… It’s not something that would make me decide not to buy this album but if I were House Of Shakira I wouldn’t make it my trademark. There are other ways to stand out. Like musical craftsmanship and that’s something that’s amply present on this album. If you want to know what these guys are really capable of, just take a listen to their - live - cover of Journey's Separate Ways. It’s almost like you’re listening to the original and if that ain’t a compliment I don’t know what it is. Of the three bonustracks I especially like Susan (a faster Journey-like track) and You Touched Me (midtempo, again in the vein of Journey), Antelope is more mediocre. There are a lot of good - and sometimes even great - songs on this album, still not enough to make it a real cracker. I'm really curious which direction the band will take on III. If it's anything near the style of the first two bonustracks that album might end up really high in my list this year. Best Of Two won't make it that far up, but there sure is - a lot of - potential in this band, so who knows...
MMMM 4/5

More Than Music Magazine wrote: ( http://www8.ewebcity.com/mtm/index.html )
House of Shakira - "Best of Two"
Well this release is a perfect choice when it comes to getting introduced to the music of House of Shakira. Since it's a collection of the two first released albums "Lint" and "On the Verve", but also three unreleased tracks, it's also a great thing for fans of the band who already own the two mentioned albums. This was my first approach to the band, and the first idea of their material sensed, was some sort of modern AOR music. After a few listenings I discovered some riffs reminding of old AC/DC, but of course also the Jon Bon Jovi and Bryan Adams feel. These two influences mostly noticed in the melodies and the voice of Andreas Eklund, who's by the way a strong talent of the band. One interesting thing about House of Shakira, and then especially on the "Lint" songs is some cool backing vocal work from the band. There are slightly africa sounding tribe vocals on a few songs, which is a bit odd for these kind of bands of course.
Interesting album(s) for sure! Take a look at it!
[ Buy House of Shakira albums! ]

Load & Clear Magazine wrote: ( http://mx8.xoom.com/loudaor/ )
House Of Shakira: "Best Of Two" ****- MTM 2000
House Of Shakira are a brand new sigining for MTM, but not a new band. This album contains the best of their previous albums "Lint" and "On The Verge", and three new songs. House Of Shakira are not your typical scandi-AOR group. They've been called "the european Journey", but I think that's not really accurate. Their music is at times much heavier, and they have been known to put some oriental influences into their songs. Granted, the lighter tunes remind one of Journey an the likes, but still have an identity of their own. The highlights from "Lint" include the Tall Stories-like "Morning Over Marocco", the weirdly titled, but great ballad "No. 8" and the catchy duo of "Method of Madness" and "Who's Lying Now". The remaining "Lint"-tracks, mostly heavier ones, didn't really appeal to me. Same with tracks from "On The Verge", I quite enjoyed the melodic rockers "Best Of Times", "The Chance", the Pretty Maids-like "Ghost In Town" and the ballad "Warp", but the two heavier tracks left me cold. A special mention must go to the band's version of the Journey classic "Separate
Ways", where they do sound like Journey, but that's expected!
The three new tracks aren't among their best ones. "Susan" is a good fast-paced melodic track, but "You Touched Me There" and "Antilope" do not impress. It seems like the vocalist is trying to sing unnaturally high, and he ends up sounding quite strained.
This 17-track compilation is a good introduction to the band, and while there are a few duff tracks here, you can program your player to skip those, and voilá, you have an excellent ten-track album!

Torch of Rock And A Hard Place wrote:
Also released by MTM is "Best Of Two" which includes 7 tracks from each of their first 2 projects and 3 unreleased songs. For circumstances out of their control those projects cannot be released.
So for those of you just getting into the band, "Best Of Two" is a great way to get caught up. They did a great job picking the songs, it's hard leaving 3 or 4 songs off either album! The 3 unreleased tracks are fantastic too, so if you have the first 2, you must have this one as well. (great marketing guys!) "Susan" is an amazing track! Maybe they don't know you're supposed to put your best stuff on your albums! In their defense, the 3 unreleased are a bit different than their other work. Either Andreas is purposely singing a bit more like Steve Perry, or this is their original lead singer Mikael Eriksson. Either way, it's good stuff.

Andrew at www.melodicrock.com wrote:
A perfect companion piece to the band's new album - that is of course if you haven't been wise enough to befriend this band from the start. Perfect AOR as we love it dished up. This compilation come from their 2 deleted albums (thanks to their original label going under) and adds three unreleased tracks. Two of them worthy of having for sure, but for the track Susan - this is one of the great anthem AOR rockers ever! Why didn't this make the original album? Who knows, but at least we have it now. Killer stuff! Killer band...
Rating 90%