Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Artist: Tygers Of Pan Tang
Label: Rocksector Records
Release: 2012
Running time: 49:07
Rating: 4/5
What can you say about one of the most promising bands the movement known as the New Wave of British Heavy Metal produced in the early eighties? It’s good that we still have them, even though today’s lineup has just one original member, guitarist Robb Weir. The band, which counts the year 2000 as its rebirth, needed a whole 12 years to put out its third studio album since then (ninth overall), this time called »Ambush«. Compared with its slightly “laid-back,” hard-rock-leaning predecessor »Animal Instinct« (2008), it brings back some of that typical island heavy metal venom.
Tygers Of Pan Tang were always known for drawing inspiration from the heavy rock and hard rock bands of the seventies, and in the early days even a whiff of punk rawness wasn’t ruled out, something that in fact rubbed off on the whole NWOBHM scene.
Compared with its predecessor »Animal Instinct«, »Ambush« gives off the general feel of a faster, sharper album! And since Tygers of Pan Tang always liked flirting with rock ‘n’ roll, unlike their NWOBHM contemporaries, they still occasionally tip their hat to early Saxon on the new album too. On »Ambush«, today’s Tygers of Pan Tang do what they do best. Once again they ride on a premise of songs that stand with one foot firmly in heavy rock (Rock & Roll Dream, Man on Fire, Hey Suzie!), but this time they add a lot more gas on the speed pedal than on the predecessor, which results in a dose of the product with more bite. The opener Keeping Me Alive, with its main riff, could easily slot onto any of the band’s early-eighties albums. Jacopo Meille, a vocalist of Italian descent, handles English very respectably (Weir surely wouldn’t have taken him into the TOPT ranks otherwise), and his voice still likes to lean toward Robert Plant (in his eighties era) or Jack Russell (Great White), though given the darker atmosphere, that feel is well disguised this time.
»Ambush« is, admittedly, decently close to the gloomier “esoterica” of the long-gone NWOBHM world, but it’s not as convincing there as the 2001 comeback album »Mystical«, which doesn’t mean it’s a bad album by any stretch. Times change, and it would be unfair to demand a “replica” of the album »Spellbound« from the band. Production? Chris Tsangerides. Enough said. If anyone knows and understands the energy of bands like this, it’s the guy who was part of the NWOBHM movement himself back then with his band More. It’s thanks to Tsangerides’s studio “tricks” that the album once again feels closer to the eighties. It evokes a gloomy drama theater full of doom and the occult, something the energetic vibe of the metal bands of the NWOBHM movement practically demanded, since it was a trademark that shaped their uniqueness. Weir hasn’t forgotten how to forge good guitar phrases. The band trades on loads of songwriting experience, and even when a song has nothing special going on in the verse, a great chorus pulls it up out of the average (Hey Suzie!, Play to Win). Of course, the tracks Keeping Me Alive, She, One of a King and These Eyes are the real workhorses that keep Tygers of Pan Tang’s bond with the first half of the eighties rock-solid, which makes this album plenty appealing.
Lineup
Jacopo Meille – vocals
Robb Weir – guitar
Dean Robertson – guitar
Gavin Gray – bass
Craig Ellis – drums, percussion
Production
Chris Tsangerides
Track list
1. Keeping Me Alive
2. These Eyes
3. One Of A Kind
4. Rock & Roll Dream
5. She
6. Man On Fire
7. Play To Win
8. Burning Desire
9. Hey Suzie
10. Mr. Indispensable
11. Speed
