Mikey Jones is the former bass player and main songwriter for the band Kick, who were signed to Sanctuary Records in 1998 and sold over 30,000 albums worldwide. Kick has since faded into obscurity, but Mikey is back with his debut solo release “The Light of Day,” released on his co-owned label E-Z Sounds.

The opening track “Suffocating” is stunning, to say the least, with overtones of music reminiscent of Alice Cooper. The guitar sounds are chiseled in a harpsichord style releasing an overabundance of sweet riffs. Some of these are old, unreleased demos, and some are newly-written tracks-- making this sort of like the past and present of Mikey Jones. The man plainly knows how to write great tunes such as “No Tomorrow” and “As One.” Song after song “The Light of Day” gets stronger and stronger.

Another killer tune is “Swear Blind,” which you can sing along with all day. The only thing keeping this CD from a five-star rating is the engineering of the vocals, which I feel was not up to par.