Rock in a Hard Place

I have a little problem with Bloodgood: I haven’t been able to pick up the best of their albums. Why is that? Simple put, because basically almost all their albums are good. The first two are jewels and ‘Shake it’ is certainly, in its own way a killer album. ‘Shake it’ is by far their heaviest album. In the base of this band, their heaviest material can be easily compared to Def Leppard.

‘Shake it’ opens and it rocks, it really rocks. Les sings here using higher tones, which sometimes can be interpreted as whining but still he is a great vocalist. The guitar solo here is less melodic comparing it to next songs. The song has a great vibe although the drum patterns are somewhat weird. ‘Never be the same’ has these clean guitars and has a better flow and riff. The structure is better and the vocal delivery is better because he sings using more middle tones. There are guitar fills all around which are kinda nice.

‘In the presence’ is next and again the clean guitars drive the song and the vocal melodies here are much better. This reveals the first problem; this song resembles too much the past one. This is a recurrent problem with this band, Sacred Warrior and some others. ‘What have I done?’ follows and again, the remarkable resemblance to the past 2 songs is remarkable. This song is kind of a ballad and it works really fine because of the electro acoustic guitars driving riffs and the slow pace. This one transmits a lot of feeling which is always nice and it is not sappy at all. ‘Heaven on Earth’ is a faster track. The light guitar distortion doesn’t help increasing the crunch or power of this album but that is, without any doubt mind you, the style David Zaffiro imprinted in the band and to all his works with Holy Soldier and his solo career so it is not a production problem or anything.

Next we have ‘Do or die’ is the fastest track, somewhat reminding the speedy riffs and pace of Motorhead although the vocal melodies are not that good. ‘She’s gone’ is next and it is ballad. I think it is better than ‘What have I done’ because of the interlude piano here and there but without overpowering the clean guitars. ‘The world’ is pretty much a regular track without any outstanding characteristics. It is not filler but it is forgettable except perhaps the screaming that fills the song which is actually very nice and the guitar melodies. ‘Seven’ is the last song and is the other song with keyboards. It has a great depressing feeling. The vocal melodies drive the song. The riff is actually boring but the keyboards give a special feeling to the song but it kind of drags on itself and gets boring.

I would say that as far as consistency the first album is better but this one is good in terms of heaviness (for Bloodgood standards) and a really nice addition to their catalog. As standout tracks I’d appoint to: Shakin it, Never be the same, Heaven on Earth and the ballad ‘She’s gone’. Other than that the rest are somewhat forgettable. This is not the ultimate heavy metal band if you are wondering that. It was a good band especially concerning the vocal delivery but proceed with precaution since Les’ vocals could be annoying to some people. His skills rely on the theatrical mood he can transmit. Even so, Bloodgood is still regarded as one of the legends in Christian heavy metal of the middle 80s.