Taker - It Is Finished (2014)

As a music fan, and a metal fan, I love to dig into the history of bands and find out where they came from.  I enjoy hearing early demo material from well-known bands, because it's often indicative of whether or not the band's musical prowess or abilities are their own, or whether their early records needed a lot of "studio magic" to make them sound good.  It's also interesting to hear demo material from bands that never quite got to that place where they got a record deal, so all that is available is studio demos, live recordings, basement tapes, etc.  Either way, an interesting historical perspective.

In the case of white metal band Taker, the latter is the case.  Taker never quite got off the ground, and as a result, all we have are demo recordings to understand where they were at.  Originating in Virginia, this band never got a record deal, and officially only 2 demo recordings exist with any level of distribution.  Thankfully, we have Roxx Productions to dig up recordings like these and make them more widely available to the underground music enthusiast like myself.  Not all recordings like this are going to be at a level of quality that warrants repeated listens, but thankfully, Taker is at least an interesting enough case to be worth checking out.

Taker plays the traditional American style of melodic, 1980's heavy metal sound.  There's a bit of NWOBHM influence here and there, with some fast riffing in songs like "He Is The Light" or "Living By Faith", and big, anthemic choruses that try and get a hook stuck in your head that you'll be singing long after the song is done playing.  As this is a collection of demo material, the quality varies from song to song, especially because much of this is likely tape transfers, so there is a bit lost in the analog-to-digital conversion.  In addition, there are a couple tracks where some damage to the tape(s) was apparent, as there are spots where the song sounds garbled or cuts out briefly.  This is to be expected from archival releases like this, but it's unfortunate that a better quality or less-played copy wasn't available for use.  Still, all things considered, it sounds pretty decent, and is in some ways a step up from some of the previous archive stuff Roxx did early on (like Eternal Ryte's demo material).

As expected with demo material, not everything here sounds fantastic, especially the first 4 or 5 tracks from the band's 1st demo and rehearsal tapes.  The guitars are crunchy and distorted enough, even on those tracks, so they get the job done, and you can tell the players have talent and have clearly rehearsed the material, because it's generally well-executed.  Things pick up near the middle of the CD when you get to the tracks that the band did for an Image Records session.  I could see Taker fitting well on the Image roster alongside Zion and Dreamer, but it never quite happened.  The recording quality steps up quite a bit from that point forward, and it helps give the material a bit more weight and presence.  You can also hear the consistency in performance between the early versions of "Open Your Heart" and "He Is The Light" between the 2 recordings as well.  Bass guitar is present more on the later tracks, and though standard for the music, sounds good given the time frame of the recordings.  Drumming is powerful and solid, and there are a few spots (especially in the re-record of "Yesterday, Today and Forever") where some studio wizardry gives the drums a bit of extra flair.

Lyrically, being from the 1980's, white metal, and following in the Barren/Neon Cross vein, you know what you're going to get here.  Unapologetic expression of love for and faith in Jesus Christ are the bread and butter here, and for the most part, it works well, except when things get a bit clumsy, like "The Measure" or "Look Into His Eyes".  But then metal lyrics from that era aren't known for being highly poetic, so this should be no surprise.  Vocally, Kevin Potter sticks out to me as the weak point of the band.  He can scream and hit higher notes, but there are times when I feel like he's just a bit flat, and other times when he dips into a-melodic territory in places where it doesn't make sense.  He just doesn't quite hit all the rights notes when it counts, which is something that might have been able to have been ironed out with more rehearsal, more studio time to get the right take, etc.  It's not a huge detriment, given that this is demo material, but it does detract somewhat from the songs.

Ultimately, this is going to be a release that is mostly of interest to hobbyists like myself who are interested in the history of "Christian metal".  If you're looking for the next Barren Cross, you won't find it here, but this is mostly a good listen from start to finish, minus a few embarrassing lyrical and vocal bits, and the fact that about a third of the material is repeated on the CD more than once.  The songs aren't overly memorable, though I did find myself humming the chorus of "Open Your Heart" a few times during the course of listening to this CD for the purposes of review.  This stuff would never have set the world on fire, but it does show a solid band that, with a little more practice and time, could have made a bigger impact.  Recommended for the collector and enthusiast.

60/100

Theocracy - Theocracy re-issue (2013)

Anyone who has read through a number of posts on this blog over the last few years knows I'm a big Theocracy fan.  Their last 2 albums, "As the World Bleeds" and "Mirror of Souls" are both excellent examples of progressive power metal, and I own both the CD and vinyl issues of both, as well as the 7" vinyl release for the "Wages of Sin" single.  Needless to say, I'm a fan.  That wasn't always the case, however, as I didn't discover them right away when Matt Smith debuted the project a decade ago.  And after I did listen to samples online and heard some of the material, I wasn't immediately taken with it like some were.  I bought the debut, listened to it and shelved it, having been somewhat unsatisfied with Matt's vocal performance and the lack of overly memorable material.  2008's "Mirror of Souls" was a completely different story, as it hit me hard when it came out, and was exactly what I wanted to hear.

Now that Matt and company have established themselves as one of the front runners of the power/prog scene in the US and abroad, Ulterium records has seen fit to re-issue the debut and give it a bit of a proper release.  On the original, the mix was a bit weak, and didn't give the material enough weight.  In addition, Matt used a drum machine for all the drum parts, which didn't really bother me, but compared with what followed, it sounded quite out of place.  This re-issue seeks to fix that by doing 3 things.  First, drummer Shawn Benson re-recorded the drum tracks so the album could have proper drums.  Second, the whole thing has been remixed so that the instruments sound better alongside and in conjunction with one another.  And third, the remaster has given the whole thing a more "full" and "big" sound compared to the original.

For those who were fans of the original, this is going to be a treat.  There are albums that are "remastered" and re-issued to cash in on fan fervor, but often those fall into the "make it louder" category where no real tidying takes place, only volume levels are adjusted.  Some remix/remaster projects legitimately improve the release on multiple levels, and I believe this is a good example of what a little TLC can do to really improve upon something without taking away from what the original was or was trying to accomplish.  When listening to the original and this re-issue back to back, I immediately noticed how much cleaner the mix was in this new version, and you notice a lot of background flourishes, like acoustic guitars, symphonic bits, and keyboard backgrounds that you may not have heard before unless you cranked it up full blast.  In addition, though Matt's vocals are still the original recordings, they sound a lot more like the Matt Smith that Theocracy fans have come to enjoy.

The guitars don't crunch as much as latter Theocracy material, but there's a lot going on here, as the album is a bit more layered because it was just Matt writing, recording, and performing everything on his own, so he could afford to go all out.  Bass guitar is present, but still not very noticeable in the mix, so aside from the low rumble you hear under the guitar and keyboards, you don't get much of that coming through outside of parts where there is no guitar (like during an early portion of "Twist of Fate").  There is a lot of keyboard work on the album, which is more prominent than the 2 albums that followed, and Matt makes good use of the instrument here.  There are a lot of keyboard layers going on, and he makes use of all kinds of effects like bells, a harpsichord sound, and various other symphonic instrument sounds to try and flesh out the sound of the record.  And of course Shawn's drumming on the album is far superior to the original drum machine parts, and makes the album sound so much more vital than it did in its original incarnation.

I'm going to be in the minority here and say that I don't think this is Matt's best work for a number of reasons.  Matt was still developing as a vocalist here, and there are spots where he doesn't show as much control over his vocals as he came to demonstrate on this album's follow-up.  The songs all sound great to me, and the melodies are nice, but I don't feel as though they're quite as catchy or memorable as those on either of the next 2 records.  I liken it to the "Wages of Sin" single - that is a good song, but I understand why it was left off "Mirror of Souls" because it's not as memorable as any of the songs on the album and may have come across as merely filler.  The guitars don't have the authority or presence they ought to, and that takes away slightly from the power the record should have based on the style and sound of the music.  Not to say they don't sound good, but when I crank this album up loud compared with the other 2, it just doesn't hit me as hard.  Even with the remix/remaster, which sounds a lot better than the original, I feel as though the mix is still the tiniest bit claustrophobic at times, in that there are bits that should have a bit more separation.  I know I'm nitpicking here, but Matt set the bar pretty high with "Mirror of Souls" and this re-release still hasn't met that, even though it's still exceedingly good.

Ultimately, fans of Theocracy like myself are going to want to have this in their collection, especially those who missed out on the original CD release and aren't willing to pay a premium on eBay for the original release.  I would say that's a smart move, because this just sounds so much better than the original version.  Folks just discovering Theocracy would do well to wait on this and give either of the band's other 2 albums a listen first, as I feel those records better represent what Theocracy has become as a full band effort.  There's no denying that 10 years on, however, this is still a powerful album that deserves much of the praise lauded upon it.  I just don't personally feel that it's the absolute apex of the style as some fans have tried to assert.  Your mileage may vary, but I still recommend this highly to anyone looking for a quality prog/power metal album.

85/100