Ask anyone to name two British heavy metal bands, and you'll usually hear "Iron Maiden" and "Judas Priest" and rightly so - these guys are the pinnacle of eighties new wave British metal. But there are other bands my friends, not as well known, not as commercially successful. Not even as talented, but that still gave a generation of kids a little more music to bang their heads to. This review is dedicated to those bands.
Disc 207 is...Best of Grim Reaper
Artist: Grim Reaper
Year of Release: 1999 but music from 1984 to 1987
What’s Up With The Cover?: A fanged skeleton armed with a scythe glares menacingly at anyone foolish enough to buy this album for sentimental reasons. This cover is pretty standard fare for "Grim Reaper". Their first two albums feature Death rearing up on his horse and a skeleton on a motorcycle crashing through a stained glass window. I give these covers an A if you are 15 years old, and a solid B at age 40.
How I Came To Know It: I bought this record about five years ago for reasons of nostalgia. In the mid-eighties both my brother Virgil and I were solidly devoted to all things heavy metal (my art teacher once asked me if I was a 'heavy metal meathead' and I replied, 'yes, sir').
Virgil was a fisherman back then and he'd come in from a month at sea and basically buy any record in the metal section that had a good cover and featured a band we had remotely heard of. Grim Reaper qualified on all counts. I listened to his records, and thought Grim Reaper was pretty sweet. In fact, I even had a rock pin for my jean jacket. I still have both pin and jacket - here's a close up:
How It Stacks Up: This album is a 'best of' so can't stack up - this is a long-standing Odyssey standard, and I'll hold to it yet again.
Rating: It is a best of, so no rating is appropriate.
Grim Reaper is a proper metal album, solidly in the middle of that genre. It is not 'tinsel' metal, which is basically just hard rock masquerading as metal (like Van Halen or Def Leppard). It is not 'hair' metal, which is more about being pretty than it is about music (like White Lion or Skid Row) and it is not 'glam' metal, which is basically like hair metal, except the band wears make up and spandex (like Poison).
Grim Reaper is straight ahead metal. The rhythym guitar drives away - chuka-chuka-chuka - the lead guitar unleashes ferocious noodles in between the second stanza and the fade out chorus, and the lead singer shrieks (in tune) like an Opera star on PCP. Whether all this works or not, is where the burned rubber hits the road.
On the plus side, Grim Reaper are blessed with a very strong vocalist in Steve Grimmett. The man has powerful pipes, and can hold a crazily high note for an inhuman stretch. He doesn't have the range of Iron Maiden's Bruce Dickinson, but for pure shriek-ability, he holds his own.
The lead guitar is Nick Bowcott who while obviously knowing how to handle the axe, sadly seems to have studied at the Eddie Van Halen School for Noodlers. This generally means the noodle will be super-fast and proficient in a 'look what I can do!' kind of way, but it will have little relation to the song it is interrupting, and even less emotional content. Fortunately, this school of guitar solos also usually dictates the solo is not very long - I guess they play so fast that they use up all the notes available in under forty five seconds.
Grim Reaper's biggest failing is not their musical prowess however - it is their subpar writing. They could have been a great metal band, but most of the songs sound very generic, both musically and lyrically. They just don't have much to say, and the music's not good enough to hide that fact.
This 'best of' package has seventeen songs, which seems excessive for a band that only released three studio albums. On the plus side, I get most of their music all on one album. On the negative side, I get most of their music all on one album.
When I was fifteen, Grim Reaper was probably a top five band for me - below Maiden, Priest and Sabbath, but likely ahead of a lot of stuff that I now know is better. Now, they don't hold the same charm, although a couple of their songs ("See You In Hell" and "Fear No Evil") still hold up pretty well. For these two songs, and in memory of that kid with the jean jacket and the rock pins, I'll be keeping this one.
Best tracks: See You In Hell, Fear No Evil.
Disc 207 is...Best of Grim Reaper
Artist: Grim ReaperYear of Release: 1999 but music from 1984 to 1987
What’s Up With The Cover?: A fanged skeleton armed with a scythe glares menacingly at anyone foolish enough to buy this album for sentimental reasons. This cover is pretty standard fare for "Grim Reaper". Their first two albums feature Death rearing up on his horse and a skeleton on a motorcycle crashing through a stained glass window. I give these covers an A if you are 15 years old, and a solid B at age 40.
How I Came To Know It: I bought this record about five years ago for reasons of nostalgia. In the mid-eighties both my brother Virgil and I were solidly devoted to all things heavy metal (my art teacher once asked me if I was a 'heavy metal meathead' and I replied, 'yes, sir').
Virgil was a fisherman back then and he'd come in from a month at sea and basically buy any record in the metal section that had a good cover and featured a band we had remotely heard of. Grim Reaper qualified on all counts. I listened to his records, and thought Grim Reaper was pretty sweet. In fact, I even had a rock pin for my jean jacket. I still have both pin and jacket - here's a close up:
How It Stacks Up: This album is a 'best of' so can't stack up - this is a long-standing Odyssey standard, and I'll hold to it yet again.Rating: It is a best of, so no rating is appropriate.
Grim Reaper is a proper metal album, solidly in the middle of that genre. It is not 'tinsel' metal, which is basically just hard rock masquerading as metal (like Van Halen or Def Leppard). It is not 'hair' metal, which is more about being pretty than it is about music (like White Lion or Skid Row) and it is not 'glam' metal, which is basically like hair metal, except the band wears make up and spandex (like Poison).
Grim Reaper is straight ahead metal. The rhythym guitar drives away - chuka-chuka-chuka - the lead guitar unleashes ferocious noodles in between the second stanza and the fade out chorus, and the lead singer shrieks (in tune) like an Opera star on PCP. Whether all this works or not, is where the burned rubber hits the road.
On the plus side, Grim Reaper are blessed with a very strong vocalist in Steve Grimmett. The man has powerful pipes, and can hold a crazily high note for an inhuman stretch. He doesn't have the range of Iron Maiden's Bruce Dickinson, but for pure shriek-ability, he holds his own.
The lead guitar is Nick Bowcott who while obviously knowing how to handle the axe, sadly seems to have studied at the Eddie Van Halen School for Noodlers. This generally means the noodle will be super-fast and proficient in a 'look what I can do!' kind of way, but it will have little relation to the song it is interrupting, and even less emotional content. Fortunately, this school of guitar solos also usually dictates the solo is not very long - I guess they play so fast that they use up all the notes available in under forty five seconds.
Grim Reaper's biggest failing is not their musical prowess however - it is their subpar writing. They could have been a great metal band, but most of the songs sound very generic, both musically and lyrically. They just don't have much to say, and the music's not good enough to hide that fact.
This 'best of' package has seventeen songs, which seems excessive for a band that only released three studio albums. On the plus side, I get most of their music all on one album. On the negative side, I get most of their music all on one album.
When I was fifteen, Grim Reaper was probably a top five band for me - below Maiden, Priest and Sabbath, but likely ahead of a lot of stuff that I now know is better. Now, they don't hold the same charm, although a couple of their songs ("See You In Hell" and "Fear No Evil") still hold up pretty well. For these two songs, and in memory of that kid with the jean jacket and the rock pins, I'll be keeping this one.
Best tracks: See You In Hell, Fear No Evil.
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