Reviews

Reviews Archive:
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z


U
U.D.O. - Holy
U.S.METAL Vol.3 - book review


U.D.O.
Holy
(Nuclear Blast)

If I had to name some of the most charismatic voices in Metal, Udo Dirkschneider would be among them, but even unique singers need both an excellent band and a songwriter team to perform the best way they are really capable to do. And here we have a singer - comparable with the situation by Ronnie James Dio - who created timeless Metal classics but besides the solo debut "Animal House", which was mainly written by ACCEPT, U.D.O. never came up with a solo album that could compete with their classics as "Balls To The Walls" or "Restless And Wild". In particular, the original play of Wolf Hoffmann is missed sadly, the used ideas and the simple riffing of the rhythm guitarist Peter Kaufmann (formerly drummer of ACCEPT) are neither very exciting nor played with the tremendous AC/DC groove of the Young brothers, fortunately the guitar leads are well-played. No misunderstanding, "Holy" is a serious step forward in the right direction for Dirkschneider, means back to his crunching real Metal roots, but tracks like the AC/DC rip off "Thunder In The Tower", "Cut Me Out" or "Shout It Out" (yawn) are only average stuff. On the other hand, the bombastic title track, the fast-paced "Back Off" and the cool sounding "Recall The Sin" convince the listener with its quality. Surely a must-have for ACCEPT and U.D.O. die-hards, for all others a serious warning to hear the album before buying.
Heinz Konzett

U.S.METAL Vol.3 (book review)
(Iron Pages)

The concept of this IRON PAGES series should be known by now, at least to everyone who understands the German language, as this is already the third book dedicated to the American Metal Underground (furthermore there's two brilliant ones about the NWOBHM and one about German Metalbands). I just love them all to death and have used them for picking up informations constantly ever since I added them to my book rack. To me no other Heavy Metal related books could yet compete with these information packed publications. In each article the experienced writer staff concentrates on facts exclusively, presenting you the band's histories along with in-depth discographies, which even includes compilation-contributions and single B-sides. Instead of wasting lots of pages for their own personal views on the artist's work (like other book authors do...), you'll get facts, facts and even more facts! This time they've managed to fill no less than 208 halfsize pages with 146 new band entries. So, in case you tasted blood now (which I suppose...), send 25,50DM (+1,50DM for postage inside of Germany) to: I.P. Verlag Jeske / Mader GbR, DGZ-Ring 7, 13086 Berlin, Germany, e-mail: pages@ip-verlag.de.
Frank Stöver