Death SS - Heavy Demons (1991)

There is some alternative universe in which Death SS would have found more international success. They fully embraced the shock rock thing from the beginning, with some cool cover images that caught the eyes even when I was younger, always giving me the impression they were some Italian parallel to KISS and King Diamond. But they never really seemed to latch on a particular style, evolving through the years to cover heavy metal, doom, thrash, and even some industrial metal stuff. Now, granted, the living god Alice Cooper explored a lot more territory over his lengthy career, but he had the benefit of massive radio hits early on in his time, where these guys were and are still a virtual unknown. That said, considering how huge the horror fandom is round the world, I think these guys can continue to expand an audience, even one day when it's posthumous, because Steve Sylvester and crew have a cult appeal that has survived since the 70s.

Heavy Demons might have been the record to break them, it's got some of the biggest production and accessible songwriting of their career. Big, fat, simple heavy metal riffs, sometimes with an almost thrash metal intensity. Leads that rip out exactly where they need to, although sometimes they have a lot more flash than feeling. Plenty of keys and sound effects, the creepy atmospheric parts like the intro, acoustic segments that thankfully never herald cheesy power ballads. Some of the tunes like "Peace of Mind", or "Baphomet" give me the impression of earlier Euro power metal with the drums and riffs, certainly you could place these songs alongside Gamma Ray of the time period. Part of "Inquisitor" even sounds like it could have appeared on Painkiller, and "All Souls' Day" has a rhythmic resemblance to King Diamond stuff. They even go back to their roots and mete out the atmospheric doom ("Way to Power"), one of my favorites here, which is almost the antithesis of some of its neighboring tracks, and ironically the closest they actually DO come to a cheesy power ballad in the chorus.

The instruments and production are quite good for its day, but I think the primary deterrent for many is going to be the vocal performance. Steve is a living legend, but he's got a very pinched, nasal edge to his voice which sounds almost like a mistake on some lines. Once you've gotten used to it, then it has a sleaziness about it which might have fit more on a lower tier glam rock cult classic, but I much prefer when he focuses in on some of the more powerful melodic lines where, or some of the shrieking, which does remind me slightly of King Diamond or Lizzy Borden (who were a similar shock rock/metal act), or some of the lower, harsher parts. He clearly has the pipes to do this, but I don't know if it's his accent or a stylistic choice which can tend to make some of the lines sound a little too cheesy in delivery, and I can understand why a lot of folks might have been turned off while listening to this. Otherwise, the stylistic content of the album also feels a little scattershot, not to 'dealbreaker' levels, it's clearly the same group of musicians but it lacks focus and good pacing in the track order.

Ultimately, I do like this album, in fact it's one of those I'm likely to spin first when I'm in the mood for Death SS, but it's clearly flawed, in some cases lovingly so, and probably best enjoyed by shock rock or theatric horror metal fans who want something that sounds slightly familiar but also a little quirky.

Verdict: Win [7.5/10]

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