Here's
a rather nice piece of obscure & original nwoUShm: the shamefully ignored
THE PLADS from Alaska! There might be a reason for this ignorance, but
I'll get to that later. First you need to know about some of their great
songs: "Teenage Situation" is just a killer, heavy but sophisticated Hard
Rock song with plenty of NWOBHM vibes and the kind of chorus that will
stick in our mind for days after first listening. Actually, the same goes
for the title track which follows, but this song in constructed in a much
more epic manner and employs some really neat choirs, haunting spoken
parts and other mystical & eerie trickery. Truly one of my top-fave trax
of the era and area. "Amen" starts off in a rather convetional, melancholic
rock-style not too far away from classic THIN LIZZY, but when the 1-time-only
chorus finally comes and the "aaaaahhmeen"-chanting starts you kind
of 'get it' and it's another great song to their credit, as is the complex
and more metallic "Go To Hell". Clearly this is not the studded-leather-and-fist-held-high
kind of US Metal that was starting to develop on the American mainland,
but rather a more "European" kind of A.O.M. The B-site doesn't start off
quite as exciting as side A, although "Things..." is quite OK "Wavey",
melodic Hard Rock. "The Note" is the 1st song which admittingly
sound more Hardrockish New Wave than the other way round. Still not a
band song, but one senses how THE PLADS' Metal-cred is slowly going down
the drain...
...and hits rock-bottom when the finále of "Sukiyaki" hits your eardrums.
Here's when one starts to wonder exactly what THE PLADS were up do? What
did they really intend with their music? Did they even consider themselves
a HM- or Hard Rock band, or were they just a sligthly heavier-than-average
New Wave rock band with a fetish for lyrical themes of the occult and
teen angst? (well, how many NWOBHM-bands doesn't fit into that description,
really...). It's hard to say. Kyu Sakamoto's old music-hall number sets
and irritating, childish and inconsistent ending to an otherwise very
nice piece of vinyl. Maybe their management were scared of the untrendy
"Metal" label and wanted a smoother and more mellow edge to their final
product, maybe they just had bad taste. I guess it's better not to know.
Fans of moody NWOBHM-bands like DEMON or WITCHFYNDE at their strangest,
or original horror/occult/"dark-wave" acts like THE BLOOD (2nd),
DEEP
SWITCH or JESTERS OF DESTINY should wait no further to seek this album
out. Others, well... it's an aquired taste.