MERCYFUL FATE |
| Mercyful Fate
is : King Diamond on Vocals Hank Shermann on Guitar Mike Wead on Guitar Sharlee D'Angelo on Bass Bjarne T Holm on Drums The tracks are : 1. Last Rites 2. Church Of Saint Anne 3. Sold My Soul 4. House On The Hill 5. Burn In Hell 6. The Grave 7. Insane 8. Kiss The Demon 9. Buried Alive 10. 9 As early purveyors of Heavy Metal, few bands can claim to be as influential on the modern metal scene as Mercyful Fate. The bands impact is felt far and wide from the New Wave of Black Metal's Cradle Of Filth and Dimmu Borgir to inernational metal gods Megadeth and Metallica. Most recently Metallica recorded a Mercyful Fate medley for their Garage inc. CD and out quite simply, if it wasn't for Mercyful Fate, many of todays superstarts might never have existed. But just why should so many people shower one band with so many accolades, well put simply, Mercyful Fate arrived on the scene just after the NWOBHM was beginning to loose iot's way and before the thrash movement started to take off and for me and many others, Mercyful Fate were the missing link and in many ways helped change the way we listened to music forever. With the charismatic fromtman King Diamond aka Dave King, Mercyful Fate burst onto the scene in 1982, and after two critical acclaimed albums 'Melissa' and 'Don't Break The Oath', Fate's future should have been assured, but intense feuding between band members brought the band to a halt in 1984. King went onto enjoy success fronting his ownband King Diamond until 1993 saw the reformation of Mercyful Fate minus drummer , who had reportedly become a postman. Since their reformation Mercyful Fate have released four full length albums, 'Into The Shadows', 'Time', 'Into The Unknown' and 'Dead Again' and one EP 'The Bell Witch' and are at last enjoying the success in Europe that is long overdue. '9' marks a return of a more streamlined and brutal sound, more more diret and aggressive both musically and lyrically than any of their past few records since their reformation in 1993. In fact it reminded me a lot of those earlier albums, 'Melissa' and 'Don't break The Oath'. '9' contains ten first class metal numbers of which 3 stand head and shoulders from the rest. Firstly, the opening track 'Last Rites', features some fine dual guitar work from Wead and Shermann and leaves the listener in no doubt that this band are back in business. 'Sold My Soul' with out doubt is my favourite track from this album and has a wonderful thumping bass line intro followed by some fine guitar work. This track proves that you can have melody without sacrificing brutality and finally the closing and title track '9' is a wonderful mix of horror movie style effects, rock hard rhythms and King's vocals crying out the question "Are we in heaven or are we in hell"? On listening to '9' for the 5th time, I'm certainly in musical heaven, as will all Mercyful Fate fans be I'm sure. Just one more thing, if you're one of the younger breed of metal fans who will ne discovering Mercyful Fate for the 1st time, and after playing this CD you say to yourself, yes, it's good, but doesn't this song sound like C.O.F. or isn't this riff on a Helloween album, well, maybe your right, but just remember this Mercyful Fate did it first! Highly Recommended!!! Released by Metal Blade Records GmbH, P.O. Box 1332, 73054 Eislingen, Germany. Metal Blade Records Inc, 2828 Cochran St. Suite 302, Simi Valley, CA 93065-2793, USA Website : http://metalblade.iuma.com/ Email : mtlbldrcds@aol.com |