Lana Lane was born in Concord, California. Her main instrument is her voice and secondary instruments include guitar & piano.
The nucleus of Lana's music is her powerful, dare I say DIVA-esque vocals along husband's (Erik Norlander) amazing instrumentation come from the likes of hard rock female fronted legends Heart to the bombast of legendary UK heavy metal pioneer masters Deep Purple.
Her musical inspirations combined with Erik's symphonic instrumentation comes most notably from the lush atmospheric progressive symphonic rock sounds of both Pink Floyd & ELO, along with the progressive rock/AOR wizardry of Styx to the smooth jazz styling of both Henry Mancini & (jazz legend and DIVA, Ella Fitzgerald).
For the most part Lana Lane sounds like at times a deadringer for Heart's Ann Wilson (but with a lot more musical/ vocal range, in my opinion). She also likes vocalist Glenn Hughes (ex-Deep Purple/ ex-Black Sabbath), Joe Lynn Turner (ex-Rainbow/ ex-Deep Purple) & Ian Gillan (currently Deep Purple/ ex-Black Sabbath). In my personal opinion, I think both Ian & Glenn are Deep Purple's definitive vocalists.
Aside for her solo albums, Lana's notable album credits include Ayreon "Ayreonauts Only", "The Universal Migrator Part I & II" (2000); Erik Norlander "Into the Sunset" (2000) as well as all of the Rocket Scientists releases.
Disc One: (studio album)
"Gardens of the Moon", Lana's 3rd studio release was re-issued in 2002 with a bonus cd. The bonus tracks were from the "Echoes of the Moon" ep plus some various early versions of songs that appear on later releases as well as a live song backed by hubby's band, Rocket Scientists.
Most of the songs featured here are high octane rockers thanks to Neil Citron's awesome axe work with some nice symphonic touches provided by Erik's lush keyboards.
Lyrically, it's well written with some interesting themes. I can't pick out a favorite song as all have different qualities but if you like hard rock, "Destination Roswell" and "Evolution Revolution" will take care of that craving just fine. There are some slow rock songs, such as "Seasons" and "Moongarden" as well as the symphonic ballads, "Under the Olive Tree" and "Dream of the Dragonfly".
From what I hear, Neil's guitar work sounds like he's was the same class as Randy Rhoads and similar in the wild yet technical axe work.
Disc Two: (bonus ablum)
On the bonus disc, it features as afore mentioned the "Echoes from the Moon" ep plus two brand new songs, including a cover, interesting choice Lana, of David Bowie's "This Is Not America". I don't recall the original song but from the Bowie I do know, it sounds like a faithful cover to my ears.
Also a special edition long version of "Frankenstein Unbound" which is a smoking tune if I ever heard one.
If you enjoy hard rock fused with symphonic keyboards then I'd highly recommend "Gardens of the Moon: Special Edition" as well as Lana's other releases to you.
Reviewed By Ron Fuchs on November 25th, 2002
