The cool thing about Iced Earth has been the tag-team serious metalness of the long-locked duo locking devil horns up front with your inner headbanger.
The cynical yet sentimental remarks flow effortlessly from one singer to another, as chiseled chords and so-natural-it’s-gotta-be-magic melodies spring forth.
Somehow connected to the Residents, Toby Dammit has collected an assortment of beats and rhythms to ease your aching head. Or to ache your easing head.
A re-issue of the classic first record. Fast, snotty, and, well, crappy-sounding, just like punk sounded in the very early-’90s when this was recorded.
The production’s killer, the singing’s articulate, the emotions are well-balanced, the melodrama is turned down, and the instrumental dynamics are thought out.
Sin After Sin, Stained Class, Hell Bent for Leather, and Unleashed In the East: The silver gleamed, the riffs rifled, and Halford was at his high-flying’ best.