You
have to be really blind or stupid, not to say prejudice, to place this
album in the Soul/Funk/Disco-section in a record store, but apparently
this has happened on a few occasions I've been told. If some numbbrained
fan of said crap actually bought the record on those premises the story
doesn't tell, but if it ever happened I'd give an arm for getting to see
the look on the musically impaired retard's face when the first monstrous
chords of "Night of the living death" hit his greasy head, not
to mention what the opening lines by vocalist
GOD Siki Spacek would
do to the poor soul.
"OK ALL YOU HEADBANGERS OUT THERE, LET'S
SEE YOU GET ABOVE YOUR SEATS! LOCK YOUR DOORS AND KEEP YOUR PARENTS OUT
AND TURN YOUR MUSIC UP LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOUUUD!!!!". There
should be a law that
every Metal album released have to open with
those words. No doubt would it prevent disasters like Stratovarius or
Rhapsody from ever happening. Let's ignore the fact that they were the
heaviest all-African-American band ever and just state the fact that this
album could easily rate as one of the heaviest US Metal albums ever. The
2 main factors: Fuckin' stompin'
godzilla-heavy guitars and the
meanest, most freaked-out and intense vocals in Metal history. Spacek
is the fucking James Brown of Metal! (yeah, that's a good review). No-one
could spew forth the "yeah!"s and "c'mon!"s like this
guy could. Think Halford, Gene Simmons and Cronos rolled into one and
you're half way there. This guy had a "death-grunt" that made Tom Warrior
sound like Tori Amos on valium and I hope he made a career in sales, religion
or politics after this, coz this is clearly a Man With A MISSION!
For a good musical reference, take JUDAS PRIEST's "Killing Machine",
add some VENOM-dirt and tune it all the way down to PENTAGRAM-heaviness
on songs like "Night of the living death", "Fear No Evil"
and the 9 minute bulldozer "Black Death". Then there's the furious,
galloping Power Metal-tornado of "The scream of the Iron Messiah",
their absolute highlight, a song that 20 years after it's release has
become something of an underground classic. No mix-tape/cdr will be complete
without this facepounding monster. The epic opening 2 minutes to "Streetwalker"
is really impressive as well. I used to be quite let down by the way song
then turned into a more generic hardrocker, but it has grown on me with
every listening. "Here comes the wrecking crew" is their most
classic and upbeat rocker, but it's still heavy as lead, kinda like MOTÖRHEAD
at half speed. Finally on "Retribution" they return to the kind
of galloping Power Metal they displayed on "The Scream.." but
with a slightly more restrained (well, relatively..) and epic feel not
too far away from early MANOWAR.
While we're on the BLACK DEATH subject I might as well mention they had
2 exclusive songs on the
Cleveland Metal-compilation from
1983, an essential disc for many other reasons (
MISTREATER, JAGGED EDGE,
BREAKER etc..). Both the Power Metallic "Taken By Force" and
the more melodic "Until We Rock" are of a similar quality to
the LP/7" material, but perhaps not quite as heavy and wild in the
vocal department.
As far as I know, this LP and 7" came as a set and were never meant
to be sold separately, but nowadays you seldom see the 2 vinyls together,
if at all. The demand for this album has increased the last couple of
years and from having turned up every now and then on fairs and lists,
it has suddenly gone very scarce, so the time for a reissue is ripe. Now
that Black Widow Records has had the good taste to re-release the mighty
RIPPER, why not take on this monster next?