Fool's Game

You ever buy an album and are disappointed with it at first, but over time…it kind of grows on you?

So anyway, a little background: This band started out in 1985 as a medieval fantasy-themed thrash metal band, reflective of their name. Their early recordings showed a clear early Slayer (Circa “Hell Awaits”) and/or “Ride the Lightning” era Metallica influence. Fronted by an abrasive, aggressive thrash vocalist in Stave Scates and led by guitarist and chief songwriter Alex Gerould, that was a very different band from the one you have here on this record. A vastly different band, with a vastly different lineup, and a very different sound and approach.

In or around late 1987, I read an interview with Alex Gerould, published in one of the major metal magazines in fact, where he hyped the bands newer, as yet unreleased material as “Melodic Speed Metal.” There was an album in the works, though the band was still unsigned at that point. At this time, Heathen’s “Breaking the Silence” was near the top of my personal playlist, along with the three-tracker “March into Fire” tape by Forbidden (then called Forbidden Evil) that I had just picked up that fall. So I envisioned the forthcoming Mordred album as potentially sounding somewhere in between these two, and looked forward to hearing it.

Flash forward almost two years, and the album finally comes out, and my thoughts were: “Well, it’s not nearly as good as Forbidden’s full-length (Released the previous fall) nor Heathen’s. Oh, and Alex Gerould, the main songwriter and guitarist, isn’t even in the band anymore; Whats up with THAT?” Actually, by this time, all but one original member had cycled out of the band, though the replacements were certainly more than competent, and in many cases, perhaps a bit more professional and polished in their musical approach. But obviously, new members meant new influences...

So, what we got was a very clean-sounding, very polished heavy metal/thrash-lite album which I didn’t quite know what to make of at first. You had some decent heavy tunes, some fast chugging thrash, like for example, “The Artist” and “Numb,” which did remind me, in a good way, of Forbidden and Testament. And even a couple older tracks (“Shattered,” “Sever and Splice,”) which hearkened back to their dirtier, more abrasive days. Then you had a couple tracks like “Every Day’s a Holiday” and “Super Freak” which reminded me of Faith no More- one of those bands which I had far more respect for than actually dug listening to, if you get my drift. And you had Danny White- an excellent and rather underrated lead guitarist, and Scott Holderby, who had a voice that reminded me partly of Joey Belladonna from Anthrax and a more controlled version of Mark Osegueda from Death Angel. So, depending on your mindset, these were actually all positives.

Clean, precise and technical thrash metal, with some odd influences here and there. Lyrics that depicted “Real life struggles,” and serious topics (Greed, personal struggles, relationships, etc.) instead of fantasy themes. So all in all, a decent album, but I always preferred their earlier, rawer, thrashier fantasy stuff. This was my initial impression after hearing this, and I remember thinking, “This is okay, but…”

…But like I said, it did eventually grow on me. The vocals and riffs gave it a very distinct feel that I would compare to late 80s’ “State of Euphoria” Anthrax, except… it’s better than “State of Euphoria” era Anthrax. Just better, more technical riffs, better musicianship, and even Holderby’s vocals kind of grew on me. So…I guess I would call it lightweight “Happy Thrash,” then. Nothing wrong with this approach, and on the occasions that I watched them, their live shows reflected this as well. Whereas other bands from that scene, Testament, Vio-Lence and Forbidden for example, would play AT you, trying to whip the crowd into a frenzy of banging heads and bodies on bodies slamming through the mosh pit, Mordred weren’t afraid to just clown around and have fun on stage, while still delivering a tight set list of songs. (Which, as it happened, were usually performed tighter and more coherently than Testament performed theirs.)

So, basically that’s the energy you get from this album here. Tight, melodic and technical thrash, played by a band that doesn’t take themselves that seriously, and doesn’t rely on dumb gimmicks, but just like to have fun. The second album would play up the Faith No More influences a bit more, and add more funk and Bad Brains influences as well, and highlight more of Art Liboon’s bass lines (he was after all the sole remaining founding member at this point) but still keep the tight, choppy, chugging rhythm guitar. But this album does a good job of closing the door on the Alex Gerould demo era for good- and bridging the gap to the future, when they would create their definitive work that would be their second album “In This Life.” It was the product of a band developing their sound and putting out a pretty decent record in the process. And yes, I do actually dig this one now.