01. Wild Child
02. XIII
03. Walk The Wire
04. Shot With A Needle Of Love
05. Killer
06. Hunter Of The Heart
07. Snakes In Paradise
08. If It's Love
09. Kiss Of Love
10. Live Before I Die
Anyone who knows me knows of
my love of 80's Heavy Metal, Glam and Sleaze Rock, and Crazy Lixx clearly love it too! Over the last decade, we've seen a
resurgence of this kind of music with the image to match, mainly played by guys
from Sweden, most of whom are blatantly too young to remember the scene the first
time around. The interesting thing is that most of these new(ish) bands are
better than the 80's bands they're clearly influenced by. The irony is that
this music which is associated with Los Angeles and hot summer nights is now
being created in the coldest, darkest reaches of Scandinavia. Among the best of these
Scandinavian Retro-Hard Rock bands are Reckless
Love, Hardcore Superstar, Santa Cruz, Crashdiet, H.E.A.T and,
of course, the mighty Crazy Lixx.
If there's one thing I love as
much as 80's Heavy Metal, it's 80's Horror films (check out my top 20 Horror
movies here), especially the Friday 13th
franchise. When I heard that Crazy Lixx
were contributing new music to the forthcoming Friday 13th computer game, I was extremely interested to hear what
they'd done. The tracks XIII and Live Before I Die were released on
YouTube a few months ago, and they fit with the Friday 13th franchise like steak with potato wedges, as they
complement each other perfectly. They were also two of the best songs I've
heard from Crazy Lixx, capturing the
energy, drama and sound of 80's Heavy Metal perfectly, so I decided to buy the
album on its release day without a second thought.
Having been a Crazy Lixx fan since their awesome
second album New Religion came out,
I always look forward to their new records, but since hearing the
aforementioned tracks, this one was clearly going to be extra special. There's
a third song from the forthcoming Friday
13th game called Killer, which I
hadn't heard before. It's another winner in a trio of Horror splendour, with a
slow and sleazy riff that effortlessly serves as the ideal soundtrack to Jason Vorhees stalking some thirty year
old teenagers around Crystal Lake. Other 'killer' tracks include opener Wild Child, which is anthemic Hard Rock
at its best and sets the tone for the album perfectly, preparing your ears for
the following onslaught of amazing Retro-Metal. Shot With A Needle Of Love would have been a massive single if it
had been released in 1989, but in fairness, the same can be said of any and
every track on this magnificent opus.
Everything about this album is
fucking cool. The album sleeve artwork with the compulsory shot of the band
leaning against a sports car, while wearing shades on the back of the booklet.
The disc itself even has the numbers in squares just like the CDs of days gone
by used to. If you loved the 80's, this album not only brings you some perfect
nostalgia, but improves on what went before. In other words, it sounds like how
you remember the 80's, as opposed to exactly how it was, providing a wonderful
lick of paint. Ruff Justice does
what it says on the tin, and it's a tin of exactly what I wanted.
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