As the album progresses the band manage to keep the high energy levels up with “Read all About It” then we have “To the Limit / To the Top” with slows things down with the obligatory heavy metal ballad intro. It’s not bad though and its only about a minute when until the heaviness drops anyway but it’s a bit of a break in the speed levels.
Side 2 and the mayhem continues with “Battle Zone” “Live at the Inferno” both of which deliver some crushing speed metal. “Star War” slows it down with some killer heavy riffage and even the vocals are awesome. A point I need to make is a lot of the lesser known Speed Metal bands in the 80’s were great but when the vocals kicked in it totally ruined it. These guys were basically the complete package with better than average speed metal vocals that raised into pure brilliance in sections. The album continues on with breakneck riffage and ball tearing vocals with “UXB” and then realxing a bit with “20/21” a very classy instrumental / acoustic break. “Hold back the Fire” is a great hard rocker and finally we close things off with “Chainsaw”.
Over all this is a really cool album and I can definitely see how these guys are a huge influence on bands like Metallica and was the first and only time the band ended up making a dent in the charts appearing at #63 on the UK charts. It’s just a shame the album has basically faded into obscurity these days. But hey if you’re reading this, give it a listen. Besides being a great listen and a premiere speed metal album, it’s a great way to see how bands like Metallica got their musical inspiration if nothing else.
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