HardReviews 7
by Martin Popoff

Kick Axe - Rock The World
(Elfin Stone)

Kick Axe's third and last album (before reunion), was the work of a band on the ropes, finances drained after more than a dozen years banging their heads against a corrupt business, staffers at their last label having been paid in coke. What the band turned in was their heaviest and most musically accomplished album yet, Rock The World sounding expensive... but soulless. The debut was a masterpiece, the follow-up, charmed but faulty, with Rock The World trying too hard (what's a Devachan?). This reissue replaces one awful album cover with one that's merely bad, adding no liner notes or bonus tracks. But the sound quality is muscular, if a bit smothering, and a listen close to 20 years later reveals some heroic playing and riffs and Zeppelin-esque heft. But alas, the sum total was oppressive, too heavy metal, the magical chemistry of the band lost to second-guessing.
Rating 6

Iron Maiden - Death On The Road
(EMI)

Of course at face value it's ghey that Maiden would put out another live album, and then it's plain irritating that the title and cover art would suck. But once into the music, one finds reason to care all over again. And in tandem with the old songs shtick of the current tour leaving me nonplussed, my eyes just gloss over at Wrathchild, (a very fast The Trooper and especially Fear Of The Dark. No, what's cool about this is hearing the band apply that unique old school rhythm section of theirs to Rainmaker and Wildest Dreams and Brave New World and shockingly, Lord Of The Flies. Bruce sounds interestingly thin and high, sort of less powerful but more technically able to hit high notes - weird, but cozily dependable. And speaking of cozy, the production is warm and punchy, with the mix of instruments being quite close to perfect, maybe a bit too much Steve and not enough Bruce, but sort of live and not hard on the ears at the same time. Any textures needed for the proggier bits are deftly handled. Nicko's predictable (e.g. the little double hits at the ride) but then again, no one sounds like Nicko. The German crowd's got the "woah-ohs" which is also a signal that this is a big love in (ha! in celebration of war), and all go away happy, rocked, sort of satisfied and reacquainted, but not much more.
Rating 7.5