Unknown Soldier

Overview
Back in the early 1980s this album along with the Scorpions’ Love at First Sting and Van Halen’s 1984 were the first three heavy metal albums that I ever bought. I wasn’t much of a metal fan back then at all, but now and again I always liked to indulge in metal and these three albums still to this day always have very fond memories for me. Anyway concerning the Def Leppard album, their previous release On Through the Night (on last year’s list at 11) was a great debut set from a very young band and in any other year besides 1980, it would’ve made the top 10 as it was that good. On Through the Night had been a great example of a young metal band foraging through their hard rock, heavy metal and glam rock inspirations from the 1970s and then presenting them in a cohesive exciting style. Added to this the band’s attractive visual style and their almost nostalgic but unique melodic metal style, instantly made them one of the leaders of the NWOBHM. So by the time of their second album High ‘n’ Dry just a year later, the Sheffield based band were probably faced with a couple of interesting options for their future progression. Firstly they could’ve opted to tweak up on their charismatic debut and give us more of the same by just refining the whole thing further, as the sound on their debut was still rich enough for the band to build on from. But of course they chose their other option and that was to exploit their position as one of the leaders of the NWOBHM and go in for a much bigger stadium rock sound. This was a style that with the right marketing and management, was an almost instant guarantee to conquer the US market and sell there by the bucketload and filling out arenas. But much like Iron Maiden, Def Leppard knew that some refining was needed to properly embrace that desired stadium rock sound and much like Judas Priest before them, who had substituted the dark metal majesty of their Stained Class album for the more friendlier commercial metal of Killing Machine (Hell Bent for Leather in the US) Def Leppard were also contented to do the same for their second album High ‘n’ Dry. In vocalist Joe Elliot they already had a frontman with an impressive pair of vocal chops to carry their newer sound across and so now they just needed the right material to accommodate his vocal prowess. The vital ingredient though for this new direction for the band, surely had to be the meticulous Robert John “Mutt” Lange on production duties, as his production touch and polished sheen was a sure sign of selling by the bucketload especially in the US. His last two album’s had been AC/DC’s Back in Black and Foreigner 4 two albums that had simply sold millions for these two bands. High ‘n’ Dry on its release was possibly one of the finest examples of a polished British metal album that was specifically designed for the US market and indeed it did break the band big in the USA and whilst not selling like either AC/DC or Foreigner it still reached the US top 40. The album would set the band up for their huge explosion with Pyromania which would arrive in just two years time and launch the band into the realms of mega-stardom. The band also benefitted from the fact that their two singles “Let It Go” and “Bringin’ on the Heartbreak” received heavy rotation on the then new MTV which would become a vital ingredient for a band’s commerical success in the 1980s.

Verdict
Anybody listening to the band’s debut album On Through the Night and then immediately listening to High ‘n’ Dry, will automatically notice just how much more stripped back and basic High ‘n’ Dry sounds compared to the debut. On Through the Night had been a raw and cohesive effort, whereas High ‘n’ Dry is quite simply a heavy melodic metal album made to shine in a stadium rock setting and with the meticulous Robert John “Mutt” Lange on board to produce the album, it was guaranteed to get the five star production treatment and it’s no surprise that the album is not exactly a world away from AC/DC’s Back in Black in style and sound. The album material was stadium metal in its purest form and was achieved without ever really sacrificing the band’s metal muscle for pop sensibilities in the way that Judas Priest had done with British Steel. The album starts with the pounding and ‘it means business’ lead off track “Let It Go” and this track pretty much lays out the stall for the rest of the album. This is then followed by the equally intense “Another Hit and Run” one of the best songs on the whole album, as is the instrumental “Switch 625”. But probably the biggest highlight has to be the commercial ringing overtones of “Lady Strange” one of the album’s best known songs and then of course there is one of my favourites “Mirrror, Mirror (Look Into My Eyes)”. The pivotal track on the album is surely the power-ballad “Bringin’ on the Heartbreak” which would not only define the type of singles that the band would put out, but would set the trend for the future power ballads that would be embraced by a large number of glam metal bands throughout the decade. Some of the lesser tracks on the album include the title track “High ‘n’ Dry (Saturday Night)” while not being a poor track as such, its mid-tempo grooves just don’t feel as accomplished as the faster tracks. “You Got Me Runnin” is kind of let down by its medicore softer middle and “On Through the Night” is a hard-charger that doesn’t bring anything new to the table and strangely enough it’s the title track of the debut album, but didn’t actually appear on the debut and finally “No No No” smacks of being last minute filler. The twin guitar attack of Steve Clarke and Peter Willis is just as vital here as the production skills of Robert John “Mutt” Lange and of course Joe Elliot’s ripping vocals meld the whole thing together. Overall High ‘n’ Dry is not a metal classic, but it still remains a vital release in the Def Leppard discography and serves as a dry run for the seminal Pyromania. Finally on High ‘n’ Dry Def Leppard would virtually alienate their core UK fanbase, as fans of the band saw their new direction as a complete sell-out for the US market and the band from this moment on, would never quite achieve the same fame and popularity in the UK as they would do in the US until the release of Hysteria many years later.

Joe Elliot-Vocals
Steve Clark-Guitar
Pete Willis-Guitar
Rick Savage-Bass
Rick Allen-Drums

Production- Robert John “Mutt” Lange

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Metal Wars

Power Metal

Pounding Decibels- A Hard and Heavy History

Unknown Soldier

I'm actually listening to this album at the moment and deciding whether to include it in the top 20 for the year or not and despite its negative reviews I think it's a pretty great listen and therefore it will surely make the list But then again it could get pushed off at the last minute.

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Metal Wars

Power Metal

Pounding Decibels- A Hard and Heavy History

Trollheart

Holy milestones, Batman! I've just looked through five pages and your views are the second-highest there, with only my own main journal kicking your arse in terms of views. The only others close are Jackhammer's, started in 2008, and another started the same year. Oh, and Janszoon's "25 albums".

But a spectacular milestone for a journal that has only been going for what, two years? Well done man!

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Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

William_the_Bloody

I don't mind if it does, I'm not really a Y&T fan, I just appreciate their style of skilled musichanship. (long guitar solos intricate song writing ect) something that you don't really here today. There just seemed to be a higher standard demanded of rock musichans back then.

That being said, please put Venom before Man o War, lol. I guess that makes me a walking contradiction, cheers.

Unknown Soldier

Thanks and it surprises me on how many views this journal gets.

Well I'm a big Manowar fan so expect a lot of their material to figure in these lists for the 1980s.

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Metal Wars

Power Metal

Pounding Decibels- A Hard and Heavy History

The Batlord

The opinions stated in this post do not necessarily reflect the views of The Batlord or any of his subsidiaries.

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Unknown Soldier

Overview
Riot were surely the most underrated metal band on the American scene at the time, as their debut album Rock City (on my 1977 list at no.9) had been littered with all the qualities of what a great metal album should be all about: a big sound, melodic flair, energetic overtones and a tight production, but its reward for all this had been a Japanese only release. But it was the old adage I guess of the late 1970s, where record labels especially American ones, really didn’t know how to promote their own heavy metal acts unless they had an obvious marketing angle like Van Halen did for example. Therefore Riot would be a band constantly plagued with record label insecurity especially in their early and pivotal days. Apart from the record label issue, the New Yorkers to a degree were also largely responsible for shooting themselves in the foot by constantly having an unstable line-up which didn’t help matters either. So by the time of their third album the Fire Down Under, the band had already lost three of their five original members Lou.A.Kouvaris, Jimmy Iommi and Peter Bitelli who had all parted company and also their sophomore set Narita didn’t quite reach the quality of their excellent debut album Rock City either. Despite the band’s lack of marketing by their already various record labels, they had turned out to be a major live metal attraction especially in the UK and had successfully toured the UK with the likes of both Sammy Hagar and even more notably with NWOBHM giants Saxon in 1980. They were also one of the first bands to be on Donnington’s ‘Monsters of Rock’ bill and appeared on the Monsters of Rock split album in 1980 as well. So the band certainly had the credentials as far as metal was concerned and in fact British metal fans went ape**** over Riot as a live act according to most accounts! So by the time of their 1981 release the Fire Down Under, the band put out an album that was not only their best to date, but also an album that should’ve launched them into the big league, as yet again the album with Guy Speranza’s strong bell-like voice and all the previously mentioned metal qualities of the band were strongly present here as well. The album’s best known song would be “Swords and Tequilla” and the excellent single “Outlaw” but much like their previous two albums, the Fire Down Under would be plagued by the dreadful albino type creature that was the mainstay of the band’s album covers and in the golden age of album cover marketing, their albino creature was hardly ‘Eddie the Head’. But the real Achilles heel of the band was surely their already aforementioned problems they had with their various record labels and this would reach a head with the release of the Fire Down Under album, as I once read that the record label claimed that the album was just too loud to be issued (would love to quote this but I’ve no idea where I actually read it) which seems a crazy notion now to be aimed at a metal band, but then again back in the early pioneer days of the late-1960s Blue Cheer faced such absurd accusations as well.

Verdict
Upon hearing the Fire Down Under album we have a recording that was surely an example of a band at their peak and I’ve even seen the band at this time as being described as the “American NWOBHM”. This of course doesn’t make much sense in a singular context, but on further analysis it does, as its contradiction in terms simply means taking the British metal model and reinterpretating it in an American fashion which the band most certainly did. The band had also completely adopted the twin-guitar attack of Tipton & Downing from Judas Priest to animate proceedings even further and the issued album stylistically despite its American arena/stadium rock intentions, probably sits somewhere between NWOBHM stalwarts such as Saxon and new speed metal merchants Raven in terms of both bite and attitude. The album opener “Swords and Tequila” is a blustery metal opener and with its revved-up Saxon type feel it’s one of the band’s best ever known tracks. The title track “Fire Down Under” is an even faster effort and evokes the speed metal of Raven here in perfect fashion and is highlighted by the speed playing of guitarists Mark Reale and Rick Ventura who don’t miss a note! When the band decide to slow things down, the heaviness as is often the case increases and Riot are no exception to that rule, but Riot as a band really had the ability to produce a certain amount of moodiness and haziness when this occurred and on the excellent “Feel the Same” the band kind of evoked that Led Zeppelinesque moodiness from the 1970’s and the song also predates the lumbering future sound of a band like Soundgarden. The track “The Altar of the King” cleverly transcends from being an acoustic Ritchie Blackmore Rainbow type track into a roaring Ritchie Blackmore Rainbow type effort. Then when the band try to meld the two speeds together to find that perfect middle ground, they come out with a commercial cracker like “Outlaw” along with the lesser but decent b-side opener “Don’t Hold Back”. The only real flaw of the album is that the band were also struggling for quality material at times and the filler that they have tends to mount up as is often the case towards the rear end of the album. These include some of their faster tracks “Don’t Bring Me Down” and “Run for Your Life” and then there is the more commercial Rick Ventura penned “No Lies” which lacks really where it matters for this type of song. The album closer “Flashbacks” with its guitar carnage in a concert setting is largely a bad choice to finish the album on, it would’ve worked on a live album but not on a studio one. Overall the Fire Down Under is one of the more solid American metal albums of the early 1980s largely thanks to Guy Speranza on vocals his last for the band and the guitarist Mark Reale (both of whom sadly passed away in 2003 and 2012) The Fire Down Under is from a time where American metal in its pre-glam and pre-thrash days, was always kind of seen as a wandering entity compared to its more focused British counterpart and always suffered for that exact reason. Finally if the album had ejected some of filler tracks it would’ve figured much higher on this year’s list due to the quality of the material that the band were capable of putting out.

Guy Speranza- Vocals
Mark Reale- Guitar
Rick Ventura- Guitar
Kip Leming- Bass
Sandy Slavin- Drums

Production- Steve Loeb

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Metal Wars

Power Metal

Pounding Decibels- A Hard and Heavy History

The Batlord

That just might be the worst album cover in history. What the **** were they thinking?

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William_the_Bloody

Yes... well to each there own, Manowar is defiantly talented but,,,,,well...wait a second here... I'm having seconds thoughts. There so cheesy that they're
kind of cool.

The Batlord

Exactly.

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