Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Artist: Jameson Raid
Label: Rising Records
Release: year
Running time: 56:28
Rating: 4.5/5
On July 1, 2015, the debut from a band that critics and connoisseurs count as part of the New Wave of British Metal movement slipped out in total silence, even though their career stretches way back to 1975, when they were playing old-school bluesy hard rock. That band is Britain’s Jameson Raid, and this is their (finally) first real studio debut. The band already released a first EP, »Seven Days of Splendour«, back in 1979, quickly followed the next year by a second EP, »End of A Part One«, and then the demo »Electric Sun« in 1982. That’s where the story went quiet for years. In 2010 the guys woke up from their long dormancy and released a compilation CD of old material, re-recorded from scratch, titled »Just As the Dust Has Settled«, followed in 2011 by the live album »Live at the O2 Academy«. In 2012 the band put out yet another compilation of old material, titled »The Beginning of Part II«. Then came a stretch of writing new material, eagerly announced first by the single Truth and Heresy (2014), followed by the excellent EP »9 Reasons« with its outstanding title track.
»Uninvited Guests« is an album that plenty of the band’s NWoBHM contemporaries would bow down to. Jameson Raid, totally overlooked on the scene, have pulled together a record without a single bit of filler padding out the running time. It’s a run of wildly inspired, faithfully carved guitar phrases from the old, ossified school of British metal, with a deliberately dirty production “juiciness” that really defined the birth years of the NWoBHM. So the band’s style is no mystery. If you want some passing parallels, the approach and guitar phrases of »Uninvited Guests« pull toward Saxon and classic Judas Priest from 1982-1984, but with a strongly marked swagger that generates real originality. Everything the band does will sound oh so familiar, yet fresh, like a crispy bread roll. And that makes sense. Jameson Raid can’t lift phrases from anyone else, because they were part of the pioneering wave of the NWoBHM themselves. So you get the inspiration and lived-in feel of the guitar phrases, the very way the compositions are set up as venomous crushers soaked in predatory moods of dark vistas, that is, a sense of doom, the occult, and ossified, gloomy metal allure, and the cherry on top, the wicked lead vocals of one of the two original members in the quartet’s current lineup, vocalist Terry Dark! The inspiration on display on »Uninvited Guests« is something that, say, the far more successful Saxon, with their plethora of mostly repetitive post-millennium records, would envy in a heartbeat today.
The darkly alluring, noticeably bristling, wicked atmosphere, combined with classic hard-hitting crushing power, a prominent streak of musicality, a heap of mood and motif shifts, and painstakingly crafted solos in “mid-eight” passages, is the biggest draw of this album’s authenticity. The work of the relentlessly active bass line adds its own special spice and charm too, airing out the guitar phrases with extra notes dropped into the transitions, which recalls the approach of Nibbs Carter (Saxon). It doesn’t matter what format the song takes. Whether it’s an uptempo number, a ballad-leaning tale, or a mid-paced, mood-building “pulser” (there are mostly these), like the album opener, the outstanding Mr. Sunset. You true old-school fans will be hooked instantly, and your excitement won’t fade until the very last second of the album’s running time. Terry Dark brings a highly welcome wicked vocal flavor. His slightly nasal, clean and consistently melodic voice evokes, in its expression, possible associations with vocalists like Biff Byford (Saxon), Bon Scott (AC/DC) and even Rolf Kasparek (Running Wild). Pick your favorites entirely yourself. Suffice it to say that the songs are crafted in detail and there are no dips in quality between them! The album ends the way it begins. Doomy and bombastic. With the outstanding 9 Reasons (with arranging touches that, thanks to the string-scraping picking, pull you toward golden-age Running Wild) and the closing Truth And Heresy! Hard-hitting and bathed in the glow of the purest old-school metal, the kind that only an old-school Birmingham metal outfit can serve you!
So Jameson Raid have finally delivered their first real studio album, with material that ties in seriously credibly with the road they’ve traveled, that is, their classic material from the eighties. Let’s hope the band gets the chance to play as many gigs as possible and holds onto the creative spark of the excellent »Uninvited Guests«. A truly rapacious piece of work that doesn’t let up in passion and fury for even a moment across its entire running time. An album tailor-made for all retro-nostalgics and for those of you who bet on the classic British school of heavy metal pioneering!
Line-up
Terry Dark – vocals
Dave Rothan – guitar
Pete Green – bass
Lars Wickett – drums
Production
Dave Rothan & Jameson Raid
Track List
1. Mr.Sunset (5:27)
2. Uninvited Guests (5:56)
3. Metal People (4:35)
4. Breaking Point (4:52)
5. Red Moon (5:31)
6. Roll On Tomorrow (4:42)
7. SS Idol Tearz (5:47)
8. Maze Of Rats (3:55)
9. Haunted (5:18)
10. 9 Reasons (5:55)
11. Truth & Heresy (4:40)
