Sunday 26 April 2009

Vicious Rumors - Soldiers Of The Night (1985)


The band name was slightly misleading, was it thrash ? Glam ? Power metal ? Who cares, a stonking debut of high quality metal, fired by the band's ability to survive the death of early '90s metal and continue into beyond. An impressive career even if the act never made it to the top flight. 'Ride (Into The Sun) is fury and fire rolled into one, not quite intense enough to be classed as thrash, this is more of an energetic power metal. Memorable choruses (i.e. the title cut and superb 'March Or Die'), this is classic metal for its time, Geoff Tate's triumphant wail wouldn't last the distance, but as debut records go this rocks. I'd slot Vicious Rumors alongside the likes of Metal Church as underrated but clearly far clinical and important than Metallica's output over the last ten or so years. Cool album cover too.


I always expected Helloween to sound like this, but thought the German's lacked a meatiness, and yet they probably gained more success than VC, but I'd chose this type of metal over most.


7/10

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