The Spell of Iron MMXI

I really cannot give enough praise to online radio stations such as Pandora that have exposed me to bands such as Tarot. For one reason or another, Tarot is a band that takes some digging to discover. Luckily for me, a song from the original Spell of Iron album popped up on my radio station and was engaging enough for me to actively seek out more from the band. That eventually let me to listening to all the tracks from the first album and out of curiosity, I purchased the rerelease. Remastered albums can be hit or miss. Oftentimes fans are disappointed that bands slow down the original tracks, or that the result of a cleaner production ruins songs of their original intensity. I am happy to report that this is not the case with Tarot’s rerelease of The Spell of Iron.

The production is of course cleaner, but the intensity and speed are as ramped up as ever. For fans of early 80s speed metal, such as Helloween’s Walls of Jericho or Blind Guardian’s early efforts, this album is right in your wheelhouse. The first three tracks are an assault on the listener, featuring speedy solos and catchy choruses. The first track, Midwinter Nights, sets the pace of the album and doesn’t slow down, culminating in a speedy solo that rocks the listener. The speed slows down slightly as the chorus takes precedence in Dancing on the Wire, but quickly picks up again on Back in the Fire.

The album actually pretty effectively alternates between pure speed and slightly slower, more chorus focused tracks. There are two exceptions. Love’s Not Made for my Kind is a pure ballad, but not the kind of power metal ballad that has you scratching your head and skipping to the next track. It’s slow, but not meandering, and heavily reliant on the chorus carrying the day. De Mortui Nisi Bene is just weird. It was weird on the original, and it’s still weird here. Entirely instrumental, it gives you a Spanish folk music kind of vibe. It’s upbeat, bouncy, and kind of out of place. Not really my cup of tea, and I usually skip it.

I’d have to say the biggest improvement, and what makes this album worth the purchase, is the cleaner vocals. I have a soft spot in my heart for the scratchy, speed metal vocals that Kai Hanson and others bellowed out in the early 80s, as much as an speed metal fan. Its part of what makes speed metal what it is. But the cleaner production on the vocals here is an absolute improvement. They haven’t slowed down, the voices haven’t changed, they’re just easier to understand and overall smoother. It’s more accessible as a result. And hey, the originals are still out there if these just do not work for you. But I doubt that will be the case for almost all metal fans.

I highly recommend this album to early speed/power metal fans. This band plays bigger than they actually are. I only wish I had discovered them sooner, because they may be one of metal’s best kept secrets. Pop in this CD and relive the old glory days of speed metal.

Tarot, Finland’s best export, has been getting fat on mainstream success lately, and I for one couldn’t be happier. I mean, what band deserves it more, huh? What band has worked so hard and produced such fine material for over 25 years and finally deserves that spotlight? Well, OK, lots of bands, but Tarot is one of them! This is a re-recording of their scrappy, energetic debut Spell of Iron, with all the songs done up in their new style with their new lineup. Let’s dig right in.

For one, awesome, awesome production. Where the hell was this sound on Gravity of Light? While that album had a pretty flimsy guitar tone this one is big, heavy, clear and biting. And of course we now have two vocalists to contend with, different from Marco’s sole performance on the original – he and Tommi Salmela trade off their respective coarse wailing and high, clear whine like two bandits racing across the countryside. Salmela’s addition is probably the biggest sticking point for some people, and I can see why, as Marco’s distinctive voice is one of the band’s strongest points, and to divide up the vocal lines between two vocalists just seems like a waste of Marco’s talent. But on the other hand, Salmela really doesn’t sound bad, and he has a lot of charisma and style to him. I can definitely see the complaints about him, but at the same time, I’m not calling for his ousting from the band either.

The songs themselves have undergone some changes, most notably “Love’s Not Made for My Kind,” which is now a 6 minute epic in the style of some songs on the last album like “Hell Knows,” with big choirs and a slow groove and all. Some of the lyrics were changed, and I think it made the title track less catchy – I miss the original chorus. Not a bad song in its new form, though. “Dancing on the Wire” now has its chorus replaced with a signature Tarot oddity in the form of a completely acoustic set of vocal lines, performed rather idiosyncratically by Tommi Salmela. This is one of the weirder, more memorable changes on here, and it’s done pretty well. The instrumental “De Mortui Nil Nisi Bene,” once all done on guitar, is now a jingly folk tune that you could do quite a silly dance to – not good, not bad, just different. Catchy, too.

Otherwise, the faults this album has are the same as the original had. It’s not always consistent, with some forgettable shorter tunes like “Never Forever” and “Pharao,” but the standouts like “Midwinter Nights” and “Wings of Darkness” are up there with Tarot’s all time best. Tarot’s newer style, complete with attitude-filled bass grooves, demented choirs and unsettling folksy acoustic passages, is in full force here, and this whole thing serves as a comparison piece for those who really like Tarot’s last few albums. This would never have bested the original version; not really – it’s a 25-year old band recreating material they wrote in their infancy. It’s bound to sound a bit awkward and pieced together because of that, as the band is in a different place and a different state of mind now than when they originally wrote these songs. But it’s worth your time if you’re a Tarot fan, and that’s all I can tell you.