The Batlord

I'd have to be drunk to listen to Manowar.

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Unknown Soldier

We all know you're there number one fan really.

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Metal Wars

Power Metal

Pounding Decibels- A Hard and Heavy History

Unknown Soldier

Album
Hailing from Long Island as did the Blue Oyster Cult, Twisted Sister would end up being a world away from their more sophisticated and cryptic neighbours, largely thanks to the band’s own basic ‘knuckle sandwich’ approach to metal. Twisted Sister largely thanks to the frontman presence of Dee Snider, would go onto become one of the prime movers for the soon-to-be sensation of the glam metal genre and Twisted Sister along with the likes of both Motley Crue and Quiet Riot would lay the tarmac of that movement down. The band were very much early stylistic pace-setters, in that their brand of ‘glam metal’ differed greatly from the more typical hedonistic androgynous approach of a number of the bands that would form the glam rock movement, for example they didn’t follow the lines of giant acts like Aerosmith, Van Halen or Kiss either. Instead Twisted Sister went in for a far more gharish approach, which was achieved through the use of grotesquely applied make-up in order to get their musical message across. Overall this musical message was in contradiction of their physical image, as Twisted Sister as a band largely went in for what could be termed as ‘real man metal’ as opposed to the sleazy sounding glam of many of their counterparts. Their music would also be tinged with pop anthems, but their potent metal approach made the band one of the hardest hitting from the ‘revived glam era’ of the 1980s. The band had been formed as far back as 1972 and through numerous name changes and various comings and goings of its members, they had finally honed their sound and style down after slugging it out for like a zillion shows. They had also been strongly influenced by British glamsters such as David Bowie, Mott the Hoople, Sweet and Slade to name just a few and of course there was that logical New York Dolls influence on the band as well. Having honed their style down to something of a solid freak act they finally made their breakthrough, as did a lot of American bands around this time (late 70s and early 80s) in the UK where they went down a storm thanks to the UK’s recent NWOBHM revolution. Around this time they appeared on the UK music show The Tube to stunning effect, where the presenter presented them as the ‘band that looked like women but played like men’. They soon hooked up with UFO bassist Pete Way another party animal and nutcase to produce their long-awaited debut album Under the Blade. The album was largely a solid if repetitive release, but the in-yer-face songs were there and hit where it mattered. The hard-hitting winners on the album included the addictive album opener “What You Don’t Know (Sure Can’t Hurt You)” which introduced us to Dee Snider’s addictive but sinister vocals and the double guitar team of Eddie Ojeda and Jay Jay French. The Judas Priest inspired “Sin After Sin” which has Dee Snider reaching out for Rob Halford and then there is one of the album’s best in “Shoot ‘Em Down” which sounds like AC/DC in a party mood. Finally there is the album closer the bluesy “Day of the Rocker” which has Dee Snider at times sounding like Jim Morrison. The pop anthems are represented by tracks like “Bad Boys (Of Rock and Roll)” which sounds like a cover of a 1970s glam track, but it’s actually a great original and had it been released a year later it could’ve given the band a big hit when glam rock truly landed and the re-issued “I’ll Never Grow Up, Now”. The muscle tracks are “Run for Your Life” with its driving guitar, the heavy second side opener “Destroyer” and the title track “Under the Blade”. Under the Blade demonstrates all the band’s musical influences, by cleverly drafting these influences and integrating them into their own sound. Overall Under the Blade despite being a potent listen, does suffer though from its regurgitated feel from around its halfway point, but then again Twisted Sister weren’t known for their ability as in-depth songwriters.

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Metal Wars

Power Metal

Pounding Decibels- A Hard and Heavy History

Unknown Soldier

Album
Despite being regarded by Kerrang! as Samson’s best album, Before the Storm is most noted though as being the first post-Bruce Dickinson album by the band, after his poaching by Iron Maiden from Samson the previous year. After Bruce Dickinson had gone it was thought that Samson would possibly fold, but given the fact that Paul Samson was the band’s leader he opted to go on and drafted in heavyweight blues vocalist Nicky Moore ex-Hackensack and ex-Tiger, as well Peter Jupp coming in on drums for Thunderstick. The first release with the new line-up had been the Losing My Grip EP and around this time the band were also touring the UK with American southern rock band Blackfoot (I once reviewed one of their albums somewhere on here) before they went into the studio to cut Before the Storm. A number of the tracks included on that album, had actually already been cut with Bruce Dickinson whilst he was still a member of the band and were now being re-recorded with Nicky Moore, the Bruce Dickinson versions would finally appear on the Shock Tactics cd re-release as extras in 2001. Now with Nicky Moore in the line-up, it seemed fairly obvious that the band might just retreat into their bluesy shell, given the fact that Paul Samson was a hardened bluesman as well, but the end result didn’t turn out like that at all. The album starts with the pretty beefy sounding “Dangerzone” and it has Nicky Moore sounding like a beefier David Coverdale across the song, and the song is one of those hard rock gems that’s built to last, in this vein there is the previously known track in “Losing My Grip” and the album closer “Young Idea”. A lot of the material on the album is fairly up-tempo including tracks like “Stealing Away” which are often mixed in with plenty of melody like on “I’ll Be Around” and “Life on the Run”, whereas tracks like the “Test of Time” and “Turn Out the Lights” are not only pacey, but also have an aggressive edge as well. The weakest track on the album is probably “Red Skies” which was actually one of the songs partly written with Bruce Dickinson. As for the album overall, the most interesting aspect of this album is its distinctly hard rock feel as opposed to a metal one. In regards to this direction, it’s all credit to the band as well, for keeping their bluesy roots at a minimum here, which thankfully keeps the album contemporary for its time. Also I’m guessing that Eddie Vedder long before his Pearl Jam days, may well have been a fan of Nicky Moore vocals, because they both have that same powerful depth to their voices. Before the Storm probably sits on the same level as Shock Tactics for Samson’s best album, but wheras Shock Tactics veered towards a more straight heavy metal sound, Before the Storm goes in for a more melodic hard rock one and of the two I’d probably sooner listen to Before the Storm despite the fact that Shock Tactics is better song for song. Finally over the course of the decade the band’s credibility and finally their fanbase sadly dwindled, leaving Samson as being no more than largely one of those bands that had missed their big opportunity much earlier on in the decade.

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Metal Wars

Power Metal

Pounding Decibels- A Hard and Heavy History

Unknown Soldier

Album
Vandenberg were a Dutch hard rock band named after their guitarist Ad ‘Adje’ van den Berg aka Adrian (following on from the likes of Montrose and Samson etc here) and legend has it that he once failed an audition for Thin Lizzy, which is a surprise given his guitar mastery! Anyway the band’s history mirrors that of so many other bands, in that the band’s various members had cut their chops with local smaller bands before coming together under the guise of Vandenberg (a very Dutch name btw) From the word go their sound would be an accomplished melodic hard rock that was heavily infused with some delicious AOR, and their debut would be distinctly aimed at the US market. The band also made their intentions felt, by touring as support in the US to bigger names like Ozzy Osbourne and a revitalised Kiss (who appear later in this year’s list) and in many ways their album should’ve made a much bigger splash than it actually did, given the band’s touring exposure and chart guaranteed sound. The album was recorded at Jimmy Page’s Sol Studios where the band issued a strong if not overly original collection of commercial twinkers. The album’s opening track “Your Love is in Vain” and the soon-to-be single “Burning Heart” are about as commercial as it gets here and could’ve been made by any number of similar 1980s heavy/AOR outfits. In fact “Burning Heart” would end up by being a big single for the band, where it cracked the US top 40 the following year. But the reason why this album is here, is for songs like “Back on My Feet” “Wait” and “Nothing to Lose” as all three are top drawer AOR/hard rock numbers built to last and being an AOR nut and just listening to them it’s like sex to my ears! Faster tracks like “Ready for You” are well placed to keep the tempo of the album ticking along nicely and parts of the neo-classical influenced “Too Late” sound like the obligatory Rob Halford track in places. The only genuine weak track on the album is the album closer “Out in the Streets” which sounds like a rapid re-run of a couple of album’s earlier tracks. Band vocalist Bert Heerink is a great vocalist, with that crisp yet powerful sound and his style very much pre-dates for example a vocalist like Timo Tolkki of Stratovarius by almost a decade and Adrian Vandenberg is a genuine axe-slinger of real talent and is unsurprisingly the star of the show here. As said earlier the album should’ve made a much bigger splash than it did, because with songs like “Burning Heart” which sounds like the quintessential power-ballad, a number of years before they became a semi-permanent feature of the US charts. The band were fully aware of what to deliver here and in this vein most of the album’s material also falls into the essential commercial addictive category as well. In fact I’ve read a number of reviews about this album and its detractors often state how the band’s influences can be heard from a mile off, but one thing is certain though and that anybody listening to the Vandenberg debut, will hear a whole load of familiar sounding tunes, that better known bands would be putting out in terms of style not too long after this album. In hindsight Vandenbergh seemed like commercial metal pioneers for the early 1980s US market and I guess if the album had come out a couple of years later, they probably would be as well remembered as the far better known Europe.

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Metal Wars

Power Metal

Pounding Decibels- A Hard and Heavy History