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Velvet Viper ‎–The 4th Quest For Fantasy cd [original]

69.00kr149.00kr

Out of stock

Description

First cd press with black and white snake on cd artwork

Velvet Viper was essentially Zed Yago reformed by vocalist Jutta and drummer Bubi. The band was unable to use the previous title due to a legal injunction by former Zed Yago members. This Hamburg based metal band included Roy Last (RIP) on guitars, Zed Yago bassist Lars Ratz (also of Metalium), Zed Yago drummer Bubi The Schmied (RIP) all backing up the vocals by Jutta Weinhold, who have lost none of chops. This is a more face rocking, forceful effort than the first Velvet Viper, and perhaps part of this is owed to the line-up change, surprisingly, as a 4 piece this sounds a lot more frontal than its predecessor, though it continues to walk that fine line between classic 80s hard rock/traditional metal and the power metal scene that Accept, Judas Priest, and Helloween had erupted across Europe. Yes, the key word is power, and almost all of The 4th Quest For Fantasy involves an interesting, well crafted attention to heavy rocking that would sound superb with Jutta’s voice soaring across the top of an arena-sized audience. The cornball opera intro “The Valkyrie” seems a little dopey, but after that it is (mostly) smooth sailing. Tracks like “Forefather”, “Modern Knights” and “Horsewomen” all move at a similar, slow rock pace, but they also tear the roof out, with sledge hammer guitars, Bubi’s simple but effective warlike kit pummelling, and just a sense of fun and energy that was slightly lacking on the previous album (which just felt like a loosely knitted extension of the Zed Yago efforts). In fact, if this album suffers, it is because too many of the songs use this same, plodding tempo: “Highland Queen”, “Mother of All Voices” and “Stella” are all further examples. The closer “Trojan War” is a nice shift from a mellow intro ballad to a good steady rock with glorious chorus, and “Ancient Warriors” is what might occur if Jutta started getting creative with a Judas Priest cover band, but I did feel like the album could have only benefited from a wider range of speeds. So ignore the bad cover artwork and listen to your music and you will be treated with some fine sounding heavy metal with one of the finer female singers the genre has ever borne. It’s not at the level of Pilgrimage, as the riffs and vocals do not combine at the same level of memorable quality, but one could imagine some of the material here mixing it up quite well with the older songs in a set list. For 1992, an age in which this genre was all but interred at the local cemetery, I can think of far worse examples of torch carriers!

Track list:
1. The Walkyrie
2. Savage Dream
3. Highland Queen
4. Modern Knights
5. Mother Of All Voices
6. Forefather
7. Stella
8. Ancient Warriors
9. Horsewoman
10. Walkyries
11. Trojan War

Additional information

Label

T.A.O.B. Products

Release Year

Catalogue Number

SPV 084-24792