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T.T. Quick – Metal of Honor (1986)


Hello beautiful creatures! Another Sunday and another meeting with positive reviews! Today I‘m going to talk about a band which was one of the first bands signed by legendary label Megaforce Records. I will not lie to you: metal music is close to my heart but when I was doing my research I couldn’t recall anything from this band. Their career maybe wasn’t long and extremely successful but nonetheless, they left us a couple of good tracks on their most popular album Metal of Honor. Band started their journey in 1979 and a couple of years later they signed a mayor label contract. The alum I will be reviewing today was their second, after T.T. Quick EP from two years before. At the start we get a great and powerful title song. Their powerful guitars, strong mix and charismatic vocal from Mark Tornillo (who currently sings in metal band Accept). At the start my first thought about Mark singing, led me to legendary AC/DC’s vocalist Brian Johnson. If someone loves this unique vocal from the Aussie band, you will love T.T. Quick in a heartbeat. “Front Burner” with its sturdy rhythm and heavy tone attacks you at the start and will not let you go until the end of the track. “Hard as Rock” is another solid track with unexpected intro (doubling the toms was a great move!). “Child of Sin” surprised me with a bit slower tempo but heave as marching armies guitars. You can hear you don’t have to play fast to sound heavy and cool. Soon after “Asleep at the Wheel” emerges and with an intro of a starting motor takes you for a quick ride. In this song drums are the most interesting part. There is a lot of accents, licks, unexpected moments that will make happy anyone who loves to hear this kind of mastery done by drummers (by the way, there is many of these moments on Metal of Honor, so listen carefully!). “Come beat the Band” is a high octane energy song that will take you out of your chair and throw you in the middle of mosh pit. Track is full of high tempo, guitar melodies and if you love classic metal from 80s, you will be in seventh heaven. First actually balladesque song comes with “Hell to pay”. Catchy lyrics, double guitars (electric and acoustic) and tempos that are mixed perfectly, create very memorable song (definitely my favourite on this album). “Queen of the Scene” is a song that continues the style of “Come beat the band”. Guys had a lot of great ideas for songs and they weren't messing around when recording this great album. “Glad All Over” once again brings my memories to connection with AC/DC. If I didn’t discover T.T. Quick, I’d probably believe that this song is actually made by that Australian's Rock Band. Once again, chorus in this song is very easy to remember and with a great solo proves that that New Jersey’s band deserves a lot of attention. Last song on this album (barely 35 minutes) is called “Siren Song” and as you can expect it is a ballad (but this time has a bit different structure than “Hell to Pay”). What does make this song great? Passionate lyrics that feel like a true story based on real experience. Another beautiful guitar solo is a final sample for this surprising phenomenal album. Conclusion: Metal of Honor is a must for everyone who listens to heavier stuff as you will appreciate craft of all the musicians on the album. If you’ve never listened to this kind of music (and only heard “Thunderstruck” by AC/DC on radio) this record is a chance for you to fall in love with classic metal from 80s. For me, this album quickly become one of the favourites from that time!

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Location: Edinburgh, UK

Comments

  1. Anonymous7 July 2019 at 14:16

    Wow, this album is great! Good job.

    ReplyDelete

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