An album title like Ordinary Just Won’t Do creates high expectations, but after reading the titles of the tracks (“The Best Is Yet To Come”, “Gone For Good” and “Heaven Or Hell” for example) it also generates scepticism and even some sarcastic laughter. But let’s focus on the music. The style of Grand Illusion should be described as pure classic hard rock. The roots of the music lie in the eighties but somehow this band has managed to give their songs a modern sound; something quite unordinary indeed. Only during the vocal harmonies you get flashbacks of hard rock history, but then again, the uplifting way of harmony is unordinary. The tracks are a combination of sweet ballads with nice guitar solos and quite moving and pretty emotional vocals (“Heaven Or Hell” is an absolute highlight despite the corny title) and straight on hard rock tracks in the vain of Van Halen and Survivor.

Highly praised is the brilliant and unorthodox way in which most songs have a strong defined head and tail. How often do you listen to AOR records where every song simply kicks in and gets faded out at the end? Another great effort by the band is the way that they show they’ve got guts. There’s no playing safe on this one, and there are no leftovers winding up on the album either. All songs are simply of the highest quality and very varied. This diversity is partly due to the contributions of fellow Escape artists Chris Ousey, Steve Newman and Steve Overland. Ordinary Just Won’t Do: Grand Illusion chose this title well.