MARCHELLO The Power of Money LP + 7" Hard Rock Rare Metal Dokken Kiss UFO TNT
$
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Description
MARCHELLO
The Power of Money LP+7" GOLD
Sealed vinyl record. Imported from Germany's HIGH ROLLER RECORDS. 100% official! -- High Roller Records, reissue, golden vinyl, ltd 300, 425gsm heavy cardboard cover, insert, bonus 7" in exclusive p/s
Gene Marchello - all guitars, lead vocals, background vocals
Nick DiMichino - bass, background vocals
Gary Bivona - keyboards, background vocals
John Miceli - drums
Side A:
01 The Magic Comes Alive
02 Boys Night Out
03 Every Man's Lover
04 Wall of Paper
05 The Power of Money
06 Rock Me
Side B:
07 All God's Angels
08 Good Good Girls
09 Sleazy Street
10 Dancers
11 Spitting Image
12 Riot
Side C:
13 I Feel Good
Side D:
14 Running Man
Songwriter and vocalist Peppi Marchello was the founder of the legendary hard rock/AOR outfit The Good Rats from Long Island. The band was amassing an enormous regional following but never broke through on a nationwide scale. By 1984, The Good Rats were history and Peppi Marchello started working on a solo album. Soon enough Marchello senior teamed up with his son Gene, who was an up an coming guitar player in his own right. The name of the project was supposed to be Popzarocca but CBS Records thought it wiser for Marchello senior to stay in the background and take on the role of songwriter and producer, with Gene being the focus of the band as guitarist and vocalist. In March 1989, Marchello's debut album »Destiny« hit the shelves, combining high quality AOR/melodic heavy rock with Gene’s amazing fretboard skills. The song “First Love” was chosen as the first single and achieved heavy rotation on MTV. Today, »Destiny« is hailed as a forgotten gem of the genre. Gene Marchello him-self looks back philosophically: “It was my first deal, so I had nothing previous to compare it to, our manager used to work for CBS so he was in there all the time relaying our conversations to them and then stuff that they said back to us, telling us that they wanted me to sound more like Bruce Springsteen or Jon Bon Jovi, but I don’t sound like those guys.” However, this was not really the end of Marchello as the band started work on a second album. Gene takes over the story: “Same band line-up, but a few other pro-ducers came in, which didn’t really work out. Me and my dad weren’t really happy with some of the sounds they were getting, some of them took it a little bit person-ally, we tried to compromise a little and do some of what they asked but it didn’t re-ally work with them.” Nevertheless, the two Marchellos completed the material for the projected second album. Songs such as “Every Man's Lover”, “Wall Of Paper” and the epic “All God's Angels” were scheduled to be published by CBS in 1991. In the end though, the ac-tual release was canceled by the label (for reasons unknown). Thanks to High Roller Records, you can hear now with your own ears that »Power Of Money« is every note as good as Marchello's debut album – if not better.
MATTHIAS MADER
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The 1989 debut album The Power of Money by the New York-based band Marchello is a fascinating intersection of late-80s Melodic Hard Rock and jaw-dropping shred guitar virtuosity. Centered around the immense talent of guitarist and vocalist Gene Marchello, the album arrived at the absolute peak of the "guitar hero" era. While many of their contemporaries were choosing between radio-friendly pop-metal or niche instrumental shred, Marchello boldly attempted to conquer both, resulting in a record that feels like a high-speed collision between Bon Jovi's hooks and Yngwie Malmsteen’s technicality.
Musically, the album is a showcase for Gene Marchello’s "gravity-defying" guitar techniques. His style—characterized by incredibly fluid sweep picking, rapid-fire tapping, and a tone that screams late-80s high-gain—is woven seamlessly into AOR-style anthems. Unlike many shred-heavy albums of the time that sacrificed songwriting for speed, The Power of Money features legitimate arena-rock choruses, lush backing vocals, and a sophisticated sense of melody. Tracks like "Destiny" and the title track "The Power of Money" demonstrate a band that could have easily dominated MTV if they hadn't arrived just as the musical landscape was beginning to shift toward the raw simplicity of grunge.
The production on the record is quintessential late-80s major-label gloss, featuring booming gated-reverb drums, layers of synthesizers, and a "larger-than-life" vocal mix. There is a palpable New York swagger to the performances, likely inherited from Gene’s father, Peppi Marchello, the legendary frontman of The Good Rats, who co-produced the album and co-wrote several tracks. This familial connection gives the album a gritty, professional edge that distinguishes it from the more "plastic" hair metal coming out of the Sunset Strip at the time.
Today, The Power of Money is regarded as a cult classic among aficionados of melodic rock and guitar technicality. It remains a "holy grail" for collectors of the era's sophisticated hard rock, representing a moment when technical excellence and commercial ambition were perfectly aligned. Gene Marchello’s performance remains some of the most impressive guitar work of the decade, making this album a mandatory entry for anyone exploring the outer limits of 1980s Melodic Metal.
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