As the Palaces Burned: Helloween - The Dark Ride

On September 24, 1991 Nirvana released Nevermind. Nine years later, a reunited Iron Maiden played Madison Square Garden. The time in between was one of metal's bleaker periods, where the genre's mainstream face all but disappeared and it retreated not just underground, but underwater. To celebrate the rare gems of this dark time - and remember our fortune now that metal has ceased to be such a dirty word - we've launched As the Palaces Burned, a weekly series published every Wednesday covers metal albums of note released between 1991 and 2000.

This is the sixth installment of As the Palaces Burned. Of the six releases I have focused on this is the third record produced by Roy Z. I wonder if history will show him to have single handedly kept Metal alive during this bleak period. The man got Bruce Dickinson and Rob Halford to make Metal again, is an amazing guitarist in his own right, and produced Helloween’s masterpiece from 2000 The Dark Ride. This is enough to forget for a moment that he gets pretty awful drum sounds and the big fail that was Judas Priest’s Angel of Retribution.

Oh Helloween, the band no one in America understands. Most people tuned out after Keeper of the Seven Keys Pt. 2. Helloween are cheeky and inconsistent and don’t fit into an easily digestible mold. How does an album or even a *title* like Pink Bubbles Go Ape get promoted to America? Who do they think they are, the German Weird Al? Most Americans don’t even understand the genius of Weird Al’s original material.

So you have this bizarre band with a weird name and a weird logo that always seems to get the shaft over here. And it is a damned awful shame. If the work I am doing on this blog turns just one person on to how amazing Helloween really is, I will have done my job as a rambling retro-reviewer.

Helloween is an awesome band. It is true they have virtually no original members anymore. The lineup that recorded The Dark Ride only has a tenuous link to Helloween’s past. Get over it. Think of them like a German Power-Metal version of Menudo. Helloween is a spirit and the lineup led by the fantastic vocals of Andi Deris lives up to their spirit perfectly.

The Dark Ride is the album in my fantasy Glee universe where Iron Maiden and Queen can be mashed up perfectly. For those like me who think Blind Guardian is too cheesy or Dragonforce don’t have strong enough songs, Helloween is the perfect band. After a brief keyboard intro the album kicks off strong with “Mr. Torture,” an incredibly nonsensical ode to a male dominatrix (dominator?). The first half of the album follows with incredibly strong traditional Power Metal.

Then the second half is where things start going bonkos. Notably the pseudo gothic new-wave of “The Departed (Sun is Going Down)” and the hilarious “I Live for your Pain.” This band is definitely not tied down to any formulas. “Immortal” is a keyboard driven pseudo-ballad that even the boys can get behind. What is a better way to express love than “I reigned as God/I'm monumental/Soon I will arise/With you by my side/And we will radiate the skies?”

So in summary, you need to start getting really into Helloween. This is a perfect introduction. Once you love this lineup check out Master of the Rings and Keeper of the Seven Keys Pt. 3.

The Departed (Sun is Going Down)

I Live for your Pain

Mr. Torture

As the Palaces Burned: Bruce Dickinson - The Chemical Wedding

On September 24, 1991 Nirvana released Nevermind. Nine years later, a reunited Iron Maiden played Madison Square Garden. The time in between was one of metal's bleaker periods, where the genre's mainstream face all but disappeared and it retreated not just underground, but underwater. To celebrate the rare gems of this dark time - and remember our fortune now that metal has ceased to be such a dirty word - we've launched As the Palaces Burned, a weekly series published every Wednesday covers metal albums of note released between 1991 and 2000.



I’m going to be in a lot of trouble this week. I have selected Bruce Dickinson’s Chemical Wedding as my choice. Not Accident of Birth but Chemical Wedding.

I like AoB. It is fine. It has some great songs like “Darkside of Aquarius” and “Taking the Queen.” But like Halford’s Resurrection album it is a safety record. A lot of the riffs are derivative and he tried too hard to sound like Maiden (although it could be argued that he was making better Maiden records than Maiden were without him during this period).

But Chemical Wedding was a risky record and an even riskier proposition since he still hadn’t regained his audience yet. Even before you open the jewel case you are greeted by one of William Blake’s paintings, “the Flea.” In fact I bought this in 1998 as an impulse purchase because of the cover alone. The William Blake art and song titles alluding to his body of work (“Book of Thel,” “Gates of Urizen,” etc.) were enough to get me to spend $15 while hanging out at the Borders by SUNY Albany.

Most of this record sounds like an alternate universe version of Iron Maiden where Dickinson, not Steve Harris, calls the shots. No version of “The Trooper” here for the punters. This is Dickinson being handed the keys to the kingdom and letting all of his eccentricity flow. Starting off with “King in Crimson” the down-tuned guitar riff shows off a much darker side to Bruce Dickinson’s sound than we had previously heard. Songs like “The Tower” are “Revelations” on steroids. The lyrics are cryptic blends of bible stories, the writings of Blake, vague allusions to Alastair Crowley, and generalized insanity.

From “Book of Thel”:
The burning sweat of poison tears/The river flowing red with blood
The cradle-robbing hand of death/Caresses every dreaming head

Waiting for the marriage hearse/To take you to the funeral pyre
So you burn the family tree /The generations burning higher

This is not “Run to the Hills” for sure. But the songs do have strong hooks and a lot of the great shout-along moments which make the Brazilians go nuts, as evidenced by the live record Scream for me Brazil.

Come for the exotic take on Maiden-esque Metal. Stay for the odd pseudo-mythology lessons. Revel in the amazing artwork licensed from the Blake estate. This album isn’t for everyone, but like Halford’s Crucible it shows the power and creativity Roy Z can conjure out of a classic artist trying to get back on their feet.

Live version of "Book of Thel":


Killing Floor:


King in Crimson:

As the Palaces Burned: Rob Halford - Resurrection

On September 24, 1991 Nirvana released Nevermind. Nine years later, a reunited Iron Maiden played Madison Square Garden. The time in between was one of metal's bleaker periods, where the genre's mainstream face all but disappeared and it retreated not just underground, but underwater. To celebrate the rare gems of this dark time - and remember our fortune now that metal has ceased to be such a dirty word - we present As the Palaces Burned, a weekly series published every Wednesday that covers notable metal albums released between 1991 and 2000.

Today's entry is Resurrection by Halford

As we previously covered, I was the only person upset when Rob Halford rejoined Judas Priest. I was happy seeing Priest in clubs kicking ass with Ripper, while Halford was an amazing and viable band in its own right. I would love to cover their misunderstood and highly underrated second album Crucible, but its 2002 release date falls outside the window of this series.

So we will look at Resurrection, the comeback record. I really like this album, and when I put it on again to write this I was pleasantly surprised at how well it holds up. It was a safety album. After leaving Judas Priest and releasing a the mediocre industrial goth album 2wo Rob Halford needed to re-establish himself in the hearts and minds of the Metal community. So what would you have done in 1999-2000? I would have done what Rob Halford did. Get together with Roy Z who re-energized Bruce Dickinson's career (this will be covered in great detail in a later entry), put together a heavy as balls band, and write a record that sounds as close to classic Judas Priest as humanly possible.

After years of hearing nothing from Rob Halford this song was leaked by the label.



Wonderful, right? I still get chills when I hear him scream "resurrection" at the very top of his vocal register. The rest of the album is a decent meat and potatoes hard rocking affair. My favorite song is the obviously "Electric Eye" influenced "Cyberworld" which has a wonderful chorus hook. "The One You Love to Hate" is a duet with Bruce Dickinson which truly exemplifies the "less is more" attitude of the album. There is no experimentation present anywhere. They saved that for album number two. This album's only purpose was to be a completely kick ass Metal record which would re-establish Rob Halford's career, and it worked.

It was official that the Metal God was back when he played as the first of three act at the sold out August 20th, 2000 Iron Maiden MSG show which we here at Baroque Bleak Brutal consider the spiritual rebirth of Metal. He was still a bit of an unknown quantity, and even at the ludicrously early 7PM set time the Garden was already packed. When his band started the opening notes of "The Hellion," the world's most famous arena got up on their feet and gave the man a standing ovation. I'm tearing up right now remembering the feeling of watching 15,000 Metal fans collectively have their own spiritual resurrection.

Cyberworld



The One You Love to Hate (with Bruce Dickinson)