What’s the use of moving on, maybe here’s where I belong
Some groups get all the luck — they’re showered with success, everything goes their way, opportunity comes knocking every fortnight. They win accolade after accolade whether they deserve them or not. They play like shit but they’re played forty times an hour on the radio. They blow millions on drugs and booze and they still have millions more than they know what to do with. Lady luck smiles eternally down upon them.
Then there’s Riot.
If the world was fair, if success was granted solely on the basis of talent and skill, cult favorites Riot would have been towering giants in the rock field. But since the world isn’t fair, Riot has instead been relegated to cult status, much beloved by a select few who know they exist, unknown and unrecognized by everyone else.
Riot has been plagued throughout their long career by more than their fair share of misfortune — bad record contracts, lack of funds, mismanagement, a revolving door of musicians, and plain bad luck. On a number of occasions the band has disintegrated apart, only to be born anew by little more than the tenacity of central founding member Mark Reale. Their bravery in the face of music industry adversity is truly inspiring.
Formed in New York City in the mid-Seventies, Riot released three stellar, classic hard rock / heavy metal albums with original vocalist Guy Speranza before Speranza, increasingly concerned by the dissipated lifestyle of touring, jumped ship to raise a family. Two more albums were swiftly completed with new growler Rhett Forrester before the band disintegrated due to slumping sales and apparently some disiullusionment brought on by the poor rock scene in their hometown.
Reale briefly moved out west — apparently to Los Angeles for a time — before returning home to revive his band with an all-new cast and a revamped image, discarding their earlier hard rock sound for the full-on, power metal assault of 1988’s Thundersteel, released on CBS.
Let’s be honest. You have but to glance at the cover to know that you’re not in for an album of gentle ballads. Because I’m a dork, the futuristic setting of the cover is an enticement to me, promising perhaps slightly cheesy but nevertheless engaging soundscapes of science fiction strife and torment. For others less dorky than myself, perhaps the cover art does the album something of a disservice, because the heavy rock, metal cornucopia within is all professionalism, polish, amazing musicicanship, and some of the finest writing in the field, far more “mature” than the comic book-like cover suggests.
I won’t quibble. Thundersteel is easily one of the top 30 heavy metal albums ever released, effortlessly covering all bases, fulfilling all needs, and annihilating the listener under a barrage of expansive riffs, blistering solos, double-bass pattering, and soaring vocals. The craftsmanship of the songwriting reaches its zenith at track six, the classic tune “Johnny’s Back”, a mid-paced bittersweet track with some extremely catchy guitar work, and a memorable melody.
Special mention has got to be made of Mark Reale’s amazing solo guitar work. Rather underrated for his guitar skills, Reale here shows an infectious combination of Michael Schenker-style Seventies groove and show-off Eighties speed in the Van Halen tradition. He melds the two rather disparate styles seamlessly, creating a unique signature sound that is very hard to imitate, managing to both satisfy the stereotypical demands of the genre while forging new ground.
What’s the album about, thematically? The worthless booklet of the CBS compact disc version is no help, but the sense you get from the album is that it’s — at least loosely — a concept album, a science-fiction story of a future, war-ravaged earth, and the disillusioned warriors who live within it. Actually, add two parts The Road Warrior, two parts Escape From N.Y., and a dash of Robotech and you’re not far from the setting the music evokes.
Riot has always been unfairly marginalized, and Thundersteel is and unfairly marginalized album from an unfairly marginalized group — most fans would pick their biggest commercial success, 1981’s Fire Down Under, as top pick. I think this is a huge, huge shame, because Thundersteel is the album which, more than any of their others, propels Riot into the highest possible position of excellence in the heavy metal genre.
For me, it’s just that good.
Technorati Tags: Riot, Thundersteel, heavy metal, power metal
In 1988, I was listening to Thundersteel, when everybodyb was all over Metallica and Megadeth. Very few agreed with me when I said this band sounds better than Metallica. I still love this band. I don’t have the tape with me now; I have only two mp3s from the album. But I will never foregt Thundersteel and Blood on the Streets. I live in India.
June 16th, 2008 at 8:35 pm