Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Artist: Vicious Rumors
Label: Mascot Records
Release: 2006
Rating: 3.5/5
The new record from old school speed metal legends Vicious Rumors is always a hotly anticipated affair for anyone familiar with the band’s eighties output, with the album “Digital Dictator” standing out above all. After the death of Carl Albert, the band never quite found its feet again. And not because Albert was no longer in the lineup. What ate them alive was the urge to flirt with nineties trends, and they sacrificed the uniqueness that made them special: melodic punch, clean, authoritative, high-flying vocals up front, and twin harmony guitars. Always with a whiff of the courtroom drama, a little dirty, a little garage, in that American manner. But those days are long gone.
Warball sparked hope mainly because three original members are back together: the band’s central figure Geoff Thorpe (guitar), drummer Larry Howe and bassist Dave Starr. On top of that, the arrival of the excellent, charismatic singer James Rivera (Helstar, Destiny’s End, Seven Witches) added even more anticipation about what the new material would bring. As a special guest on the record, Brad Gillis joined the guys, a man who has worked with Ozzy Osbourne and Night Ranger. Brad contributed guitar solos on five tracks. Together with Thorpe, the two of them cashed in on their know-how effectively, and their fingers peck venomously at each other in a great interplay.
The new Vicious Rumors are a venomously disguised Judas Priest. Torpedoing rhythms on the mid-paced Daying Every Day, and even on the opener Oceans Of Rage, Crossthreaded or The Immortal. Of course, the steel sparks at the characteristic top-tier speeds through Sonic Rebellion and Mr. Miracle, which fleetingly recall the eighties, something A Ghost Within confirms toward the end. The title track is placed in the middle of the record and is an epic metal march, nicely seasoned with a longer atmospheric interlude that, through several impressive shifts of the basic rhythm with a bold solo winding through them, finally develops into a classic riff-driven form. It’s one of the album’s highlights. A truly hopeless metal tragedy.
The guys decided they wouldn’t sound like the eighties, and they wouldn’t sound like Helstar either. Did they decide that, or do they simply no longer know how? Well, hmm… It means they’ve coated the whole record with a thick layer of “gang screams,” typical above all of fossilized thrash metal as well as early speed (that is, early Vicious Rumors). But they went over the edge on purpose and bludgeoned the album’s melodic quality, which as a result stayed inferior across the board. From that I can conclude that you’ll need more listening time for this album to get under your skin, and it’ll be (once again) harder to swallow especially for everyone who expects yet another “Digital Dictator”-type album from Vicious Rumors. On the other hand, there’s some of that typical, already mentioned double bass pedal rolling from the late “eighties” through Painkiller-era Judas Priest, which may fix the impression. And yet…
The guys wanted to make an album that bites like a rabid pit bull, but once again at the expense of certain sacrifices that are a real shame, and with which Vicious Rumors had spoiled us so nicely. What comes to the fore, even more so, is the occasionally “awkward” choice of multi-vocal harmonies, which don’t let James Rivera’s otherwise explosive, high, punchy, melodic and distinctive singing breathe. Vicious Rumors didn’t make use of all of Rivera’s talents. Rivera isn’t just a “core” screamer, which is what the singer is sadly condemned to far too often on “Warball” this time. Anyway, summa summarum, “Warball” is more than a successful return to the band’s old tracks, which was also its first task and Geoff Thorpe’s wish, with the memory of the experimental misstep of the album “Sadistic Symphony” (2001) happily and forever forgotten.
Lineup
James Rivera – vocals
Geoff Thorpe – guitar
Dave Starr – bass guitar
Larry Howe – drums
GUEST MUSICIAN:
Brad Gillis – guitar
Production
Geoff Thorpe & Juan J. Orteaga
Tracklist
1. Sonic Rebellion
2. Mr. Miracle
3. Dying Every Day
4. Immortal
5. Warball
6. Crossthreaded
7. Wheels Of Madness
8. Windows Of Memory
9. A Ghost Within
10. Oceans Of Rage
