V

With a career that started nearly four decades ago, Alcatrazz released their first album No Parole from Rock ‘N’ Roll in 1983 with Graham Bonnet on vocals. After a few rather unremarkable releases, they split and then reformed after the turn of the century. Bonnet has since parted ways with the rest of the band and has stated his intention to continue with his own version of Alcatrazz, but just so we’re clear, this is the version without him – comprised of his former bandmates: Gary Shea, Jimmy Waldo, and Mark Benquechea. Alcatrazz never made it big back in the eighties, but they remain well known for being the band who gave virtuoso Yngwie J. Malmsteen his last stage before he went off to forge his own illustrious solo career. It’s fitting then, that after all these years, they would find room for Joe Stump to handle their guitars. Stump, who exists as some form of monster reincarnation of Malmsteen (even sporting the same creamy yellow, scallop-fretted Strarocaster) fills those shoes perfectly.

If you still have your old copy of No Parole fresh in your ears, you’re in for a bit of surprise if you have any expectations of V sounding anything like it. In spite of Bonnet’s powerful voice and Malmsteen’s insane chops, their debut was more of a heavy metal/hard rock hybrid with the saccharine-laden glam track “Island in the Sun”. It takes less than a second into V to realise that this Alcatrazz reset had completely different ideas in mind when they set out to make this album. “Guardian Angel” is the scorching opener to this opus, and it starts and finishes on all cylinders, without so much as a single four-bar interlude for a pit stop. The main riff is launched at presto agitato speed and is all the demonstration you need to know that the band has moved well out of slow-rocking heavy metal and is accelerating headlong into power metal. And whilst the rest of tracks don’t quite deliver with the same force, V‘s new sound is set in stone with this killer track.

The power metal motif stays strong as the album progresses into “Nightwatch” which begins with a haunting piano intro. The next few songs revert back to a more traditional heavy metal sound, and then suddenly the jaunty “Blackheart” comes blaring in, which sounds like Blind Guardian playing a Running Wild song at three-fourths speed. And if that sounds weird to you, well, it’s surprisingly catchy. The album is slightly front-loaded, but not excessively so. I do think the best material is on the first side, but second side isn’t without its own highlights, most specifically the closing track which features a wide variety of musical influences ranging from sixties hard rock to modern progressive/power metal.

Boasting twelve tracks and an hour’s worth of music, this album is surprisingly devoid of filler. Sure, some songs stand out more than others, but everything here is solidly crafted. Doogie White is quite the able vocalist, and it’s his voice that carries a lot of the album’s forward momentum. I found myself frequently succumbing to the vocal earworms that are strategically placed throughout. And when White isn’t lifting the music up with his massive pipes, this is where Stump shines. And boy does he. He really lets loose on this album and his precise, neo-classical, shredding prowess takes centre stage without completely overshadowing the songs themselves. So whilst most would agree this is pretty distant departure from where they started, it’s of little consequence as this is quite a solid album.

Originally written for The Metal Observer.

It seems as if only yesterday that the mighty, guitar-oriented 80s heavy metal train that was Alcatrazz had returned with a vengeance to usher in the 2020s with a newly minted masterpiece after more than 30 years of studio silence. Even during their original run in the aforementioned decade that would culminate in three highly credible studio LPs, there was a fair degree of lineup instability, with a de facto revolving door of guitarists that would see a different one contributing their technical wizardry to each album. While opinions will continue to vary as to whether this fold’s strength laid primarily with front man and former Rainbow vocalist Graham Bonnet or original six-string shredder and Neo-classical metal trailblazer Yngwie Malmsteen, the general consensus has been that their combined efforts had a massive hand in the band’s 1983 debut No Parole For Rock ‘N’ Roll being their most iconic effort, and it was the magic of that particular incarnation of the band that was sought after and successfully recaptured on 2020’s Born Innocent.

All of this considered, the prospect of this grand resurgence continuing with neither Malmsteen nor Bonnet involved would seem highly improbable, but the latter’s recent separation from the group has brought an interesting twist on things fairly similar to where Bonnet’s former outfit Rainbow found themselves in the mid-90s. The tapping of scene veteran Doogie White to take over mic duties is almost too fitting, given his past collaborations with both Rainbow on 1995’s Stranger In Us All and a subsequent stint with Malmsteen’s solo act in the early to mid 2000s, to speak nothing for his soaring pipes functioning as a near perfect amalgam of his predecessor in this fold and other former Rainbow front man Ronnie James Dio. Combined with the return of Malmsteen-like shred protégé Joe Stump and the rest of the instrumentalists that made Born Innocent a near perfect return to the glories of 1983, it stands to reason that their latest studio installment, simply dubbed V, would hit the waves with a fair amount of wind already in its proverbial sails.

While the old saying of Ancient Greek philosopher Heraclitus that one cannot step on the same river twice ultimately rings true here, this album basically gets as close to accomplishing that as one could expect given the circumstances. The combination of highly technical guitar wizardry with a mixture of 70s hard rock and 80s heavy metal stylistic trappings that this band had originally imported from Rainbow, Deep Purple, and Judas Priest that typified the last album is not diminished here to any degree. In fact, the pacing of this collection of shred-happy anthems is a bit swifter, having a bit more of a power metal edge to it. High octane speeders such as “Guardian Angel”, “Nightwatch” and “Turn Of The Wheel” establish this album as a frenetic affair reminiscent of Malmsteen’s faster offerings during the late 80s and early 90s from the beginning, with Stump’s precision riffing and virtuosic guitar soloing being the highlight. Later on in the mix the driving force of “Target” and “Alice’s Eyes” maintains the up tempo factor while also venturing into darker and heavier territory where the work of the rhythm section and keyboardist/co-founder Jimmy Waldo become even more prominent.

By the same token, the more groove-based rocking with a heavy edge that has been as much of a staple of this band’s sound as their speedier material is equally as prominent here. Mid-paced rockers with a clear affinity for the older stylings of Deep Purple such as “Sword Of Deliverance” and “House Of Lies” bring the hooks home with the best of them, and also prove a tad bit more conducive to Doogie’s slightly gritty but mostly polished sounding vocal display. A dash of progressive rock adorns the shuffling swagger of “Blackheart”, which also sees Waldo’s rock organ work mimicking the vintage goodness of Jon Lord (R.I.P.), while the upbeat cruiser “Grace Of God” has a decidedly European power metal flavor to it that wouldn’t be totally out of place on one of Stratovarius’ recent albums. But the two greatest standouts of the slower end of this album is the mystical melodies and crushing grooves of “Return To Neverland”, which sounds pretty close to Rainbow’s “Stargazer”, and the early 80s Sabbath-inspired epic march of “Maybe Tomorrow”.

Perhaps the most challenging aspect of this album, or at least what may prove the most challenging Alcatrazz’s existing fan base, is the drama that immediately preceded it and the resulting absence of its original vocalist. Taken on its own merits apart from the band’s established brand, this is a slightly more vintage hard rock take on what Malmsteen has been bringing to the table since 1986 meets a more metallic rendition of Rainbow’s classic late 70s sound, and in this disposition Doogie White’s vocals about as well as Bonnet’s. It’s almost impossible to see any reason other than disappointment over the original singer not being present as a reason for dismissing these 12 well put together songs. Nevertheless, if Bonnet’s own published words earlier are any indication, there might be multiple incarnations of this band simultaneously putting out music in a fashion similar to NWOBHM outfit Tank, though absent him managing to rope Malmsteen or a similarly skilled guitarist into his version of the band, it’ll be tough to see how he’ll manage to top this.

Originally written for Sonic Perspectives (www.sonicperspectives.com)