When I discovered this band, I was sure that this album was the tip of the iceberg and there was greater heights to reach with them. Sadly for me this turned out not to be the case. What we have here is a competent 80s, typically US album with some touches that push it above the regular. One of these is clearly vocalist Ann Boleyn with her cat like howling and searing vocal delivery. You can’t accuse her of sounding like anyone else. The other is guitarist Chet Thompson (allegedly a student of Randy Rhoads) whose flashy lead work gives it some flavour.

Sometimes this album wants to be all edgy and “true metal”, as on the title track and “The Hand”, and other times it wants to be stadium rocky and glam as on “Bad Attitude" and “Easy Action". It also tries its hand, quite effectively, at the atmospheric and moody on the final “The Tower of Air”. The beginning and end are the peak of my interest in this album, though there’s good stuff pattered through most songs, though “Easy Action” and “Explode” are generally a little stale. One thing I find interesting is that despite all the individual elements they have working in their favour, it never really comes together to become anything special.

Finally, a few words about the other two albums I’ve heard by them. “The Black Book” had some promise, touting itself as a proper metal album flying in the face of the early 90s trends and this is quite true. However, I found it just plain ordinary and burdened with an awful concept. “Will Not Go Quietly” is far more aggressive and holds moments of interest, but I find it wanting in terms of plain good songs.

In the months before this album came out, I was pretty strongly involved in the online metal community. Reading all the news articles, watching the artwork take shape and at last sampling the sound of the album with “Kick the Chair”. A further taste after the leaking of “Blackmail the Universe” convinced me that indeed Megadeth was truly back!

After devoting a lot of listening time to it, unfortunately the album does fall short of expectations. While light years ahead of the despairingly bland “The World Needs a Hero”, the cookie cutter monotony is replaced by glaringly obvious filler. The first track does indeed harken back to “Rust in Peace” with high speed and energy, and a shifting structure reminiscent of “Holy Wars”. The following track cuts back on the venom in lieu of tame hard rocking Megadeth more akin to their mid 90s output, before “Kick the Chair” returns to more aggressive ground. All good stuff but the album very quickly becomes a mixed bag after this.

“The Scorpion” is an odd one to work out and feels a little laborious, before “Tears in the Vial” brings us sharply back to the standard ‘deth vibe with better results. “I Know Jack” is a head scratching and seemingly pointless segue while the next two tracks are just a little cheesy, “Something That I’m Not” being an obvious dig at Metallica drummer Lars Ulrich, but lacking the stellar composition of tirades like ”Liar” (from the outstanding “So Far, So Good...So What!”. “Back in the Day" is a paean to the 80s metal scene, and acquits itself better but has an off putting “chanting" mid section. Things warm up again for “Truth Be Told" with another slamming number that works.

The final three tracks sadly seem to lack any cohesive focus or even a good riff or two, with “Shadow of Deth” seeing Mustaine reciting Psalm 23 with a dreadfully cheesy vocal effect bringing to mind the spoken part of “Five Magics” over some uninspired music. The successes seem to be when Dave sticks to what he does best and doesn’t veer off into uncharted territory, those songs gluing a messy album together. Dave got former (seems like another lifetime now!) guitarist Chris Poland’s to provide a few solos, and they are worth a mention. They add some much needed colour and bring in a feel of those first two albums enough to distract a little from some of the awkward material here. Not a bad album by any means, but noticeably patchy and in any case a welcome return from the band and I think Dave had stronger songs up his sleeve for the next lot of albums.

“Ladies and gentleman, welcome to just another Edguy offering...”, but a good one all the same. Building on the success of the punchy “Mandrake”, Hellfire Club straddles the line between the grandiose and the comedic phases of their career.

The album opens with the two best cuts in fine form with the straight ahead but fiery “Mysteria” and the extended number “The Piper Never Dies”. This one follows the template of the last album’s moody “The Pharaoh” closely but manages to avoid the potential dangers of this and crafts a touch of its own character. “Down to the Devil” and “Under the Moon” lead the rest of the pack built around stupendously sharp riffs and a classic heavy metal attitude. The sing along single “King of Fools” does its job adequately and “Lavatory Love Machine” points the way to follow up album “Rocket Ride” with upbeat bounce and outrageously silly lyrics with a perfectly ridiculous delivery from Tobias Sammet. Maybe all that Metal Opera stuff was just getting too serious for him and felt the need to loosen up a bit?

The album does suffer from a dip in quality as it comes to the end, though “Navigator” keeps it from collapsing with its effectively bombastic chorus. The preceding “Rise of the Morning Glory” is passable Helloween worship, but thankfully the earlier cut “We Don’t Need a Hero” is a stronger example of this side to their sound. And don’t ask about the little following interlude - you must listen to understand... The album closes with a sappy and OTT power ballad, which I can forgive as power metal bands are decidedly hit and miss with those. Following this is an equally predictable bonus song and a version of “Mysteria” with guest Mille from Kreator popping up in here and there. Still, Euro power metal bands rarely stick to the Helloween format while managing to inject some personality into this tried (tired?) and true approach, so they are worth a listen for sure.

Their peak, I'd say. With Angela Gossow now on board, the band took their boldest stride yet down the road to metal stardom. Much more palatable than Johan Liiva's monotonous howl, Angela's uncanny resemblence to Carcass' Jeff Walker is the icing on the cake of an album that represents Mike Amott's best attempt to recreate Heartwork.

It's altogether more polished and straight ahead than the Carcass classic but the signatures are all there. It feels very much like a classic heavy metal record played by a death metal band, the density of the Burning Bridges production giving way to a clean and sharper sound. Metal festival crowd pleasers like Burning Angel, Ravenous and Dead Bury Their Dead have aged nicely and the album flows neatly with memorable riffs never far away. The song structures while traditional are peppered with excellent detail and they nail some sweet melodic hooks like never before.

I can't say they ever were a favourite of mine but this was and still is quite a special effort and stands tall amongst the best albums in last decade or so of metal.

I'll be kinder with this one, as I feel they put in a real big effort. They go a bit nuts with the CD format and stuff too many tracks on, but with 5 or 6 very solid hard rock tunes it acquits itself smoothly. It's easy to look back at now and enjoy it with a modern sense of nostalgia but this probably sank like a rock on its initial release in 1992. Instead of putting on a tougher attitude and cranking the heaviness up as Skid Row and Kiss tried on early 90s albums to postpone extinction, Danger Danger stuck to their guns with the same overblown pop choruses and relaxed catchy rhythms. It's still wildly generic, and its dated qualities are off-putting but this time it seems to work in their favour. The sheer fun of tracks like "Slipped Her the Big One", "Everybody Wants Some" and "Don't Blame It on Love" (the equivalent shining pop diamond to the first albums Bang Bang) make me want to revisit the album a few more times. They simply have the ingredients and a touch of variety that the first album lacked, while retaining the standard format: raunchy hard rockers melding with big sounding ballads but peppered with some small interludes and different tempos.

I find it drags considerably towards the end, with some of the tracks feeling like they were made out of leftover parts from when they were trying to come up with the earlier songs. Topped off with an electronic "experiment" at the end that makes me want to listen to Guns n' Roses "My World" off Illusion II instead(!) means this is hardly a well rounded album. They were enjoying it and Andy Timmons is of course, real good on his instrument but still, it's bitty and I never did get into too many albums like this anyway.