Rock You to Hell

Grim Reaper was an 80's heavy metal band that put out three amazing albums See You in Hell, Fear No Evil, and Rock You To Hell. Sadly bad management decisions made in the bands heyday caused them to disband after Rock You to Hell their best album in my opinion. I dug this metal gem out of my cd towers after listening to Seven Witches superb cover of See You in Hell. From beginning to end this cd will have you headbanging with utmost intensity. Their sound can best be described as a Screaming For Vengeance era Judas Priest with a little bit of Dokken thrown in .Theres many puntcuated stabbing moments on guitar that hook into your brain within the first listen. With a name like Grim Reaper youd expect something a little heavier but when you do hear the music you wont be dissapointed. The album opener Rock You to Hell is the best track on here with its frantic guitar work and the ear piercing, METAL scream from Steve Grimmet who has a clear, powerful voice, it is the perfect song to start this metal rollercoaster. This song is about bringing together the men of metal, the true metalheads to come together to stand against censorship. Its rather fitting because around this time the PMRC was notorious for its love of censoring music especially heavy metal. Ganglike chorus abound in this track and gives the song a gritty feel. Night of the Vampire and Lust for Freedom come next and the pace lets up slightly for some serious headbanging here. Vampire has a damn catchy chorus with Grimmet singing over pounding drums alone and after the first couple of listens you find yourself singing along with him. Freedom is a more standard rocker about ones quest for a personal enlightening as he ventures into a big city. Good stuff. The frantic pace of Rock You to Hell resumes with track four, When Heaven Comes Down. This track is yet another killing headbanger. More frantically played guitar work and high energy vocals give Heaven an overall feeling of aggression and barely contained excitement, this track will wake you up right away and put you in a metal mood. Stuck between Heaven and Rock Me 'till I Die, Suck it and See. is sort of lackluster and doesnt move me as much as the previous songs or the next one. Rock Me 'till I Die sounds somewhat like a rehashed version of the title track as it contains similar lyrics and the tempo of the song is similar as well. Its a little slower but still very much alike Rock You to Hell. Out of the final three tracks Yo'll Wish That You Were Never Born, Waysted Love, and I Want More I prefer Waysted Love. Despite the name this song is NOT a ballad, rather it is a fantasic midtempo rocker that never fails to have me tapping my fingers, singing the words, or nodding my head to it. The other two tracks while competent just are not as good as the rest of the album. Rock You to Hell has enough drive and melody to please an Edguy or Helloween fan and with its stripped down "guitar and drums" sound (read: minimal if any orchestration) it will also do well with fans of raw rock n roll/metal ala early era Maiden or the afore mentioned Judas Priest. Do yourself a favor and check out this overlooked and underrated band, I think youll appreciate it.