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Dee Snider - For The Love Of Metal review



Reviewer:
N/A

79 users:
7.7
Band: Dee Snider
Album: For The Love Of Metal
Release date: July 2018


01. Lies Are A Business
02. Tomorrow's No Concern
03. I Am The Hurricane
04. American Made
05. Roll Over You
06. I'm Ready
07. Running Mazes
08. Mask
09. Become The Storm
10. The Hardest Way
11. Dead Hearts (Love Thy Enemy)
12. For The Love Of Metal
13. So What [Japanese bonus]

This is one of the biggest surprises this year not just for me, but also for Dee Snider himself. "This is a really incredibly exciting album that I did not expect to make, especially at this point in my life", Dee said about For The Love Of Metal. And my guess is that no one expected him to deliver a triumphant piece of metal music such as this either.

I was never a fan of Dee Snider's music and Twisted Sister's hard/glam/hair rock always used to rub me the wrong way but the man is undoubtedly a hard rock legend. Moreover, I have never been a fan of most of the musicians that participated to make this album a reality; quite frankly I more or less dislike their respective bands. However, Dee Snider has unleashed an overly enjoyable, no-filler, purely metal album.

Dee, now at the age of 63, had no intentions of releasing another record and it was Hatebreed frontman, Jamey Jasta, who challenged him to make a contemporary heavy metal album. In the beginning they didn't even have a deal with a label, something that changed when high profile names such as Mark Morton (Lamb Of God), Joel Grind and Nick Bellmore (Toxic Holocaust) and Charlie Bellmore (Kingdom Of Sorrow) expressed their desire to contribute in the project.

For The Love Of Metal is heavy metal in all its majesty, a true headbanger's delight. It is modern and fresh with perfect production. It is catchy and energetic and full of grooves. It is deliciously cheesy during the single time it slows down (the duet with Arch Enemy's Alissa White-Gluz) and ferocious when it wants to be powerful ("Tomorrow's No Concern"). It has sing-along choruses ("Mask", "The Hardest Way" featuring ex-Killswitch Engage vocalist, Howard Jones), fist-raising anthems ("Become The Storm", "For The Love Of Metal") and American-sounding-tribute-to-Judas Priest moments. For instance, the riff of "Lies Are A Business" could have easily opened Screaming For Vengeance and if the Metal Gods hadn't scorched us with their Firepower a few months ago, For The Love Of Metal would have probably topped my heavy metal album of the year list.

It must be noted that Mr. Snider is singing other people's lyrics (about standing up, believing in yourself, fighting back and a lot of anti-bullying themes) over music that was written and composed without his participation. Yet, he absolutely and totally owns this record, his voice sounds better than ever and, as far as I know, this is the most metal he has sounded in his entire career. And this is why he's so convincing when he screams:

"We are all fucking metal!"

Indeed Dee, we are. Thank you so much for this.





Written on 31.10.2018 by Only way to feel the noise is when it's good and loud!


Comments

Comments: 11   Visited by: 177 users
01.11.2018 - 06:53
Lord Slothrop

I'm suddenly curious about this album. I went through a brief Twisted Sister phase back in the mid-eighties, but haven't been interested in anything Snider has done since. Your review has piqued my interest.
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01.11.2018 - 07:53
Rating: 9
Cynic Metalhead
Paisa Vich Nasha
nikarg is so moved with this record that he has put "We are all fucking metal!" as his Instagram bio.
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01.11.2018 - 10:00
nikarg

Written by Cynic Metalhead on 01.11.2018 at 07:53

nikarg is so moved with this record that he has put "We are all fucking metal!" as his Instagram bio.

True that.
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03.11.2018 - 01:27
Rating: 7
BitterCOld
The Ancient One
Dee is a swell guy, Twisted Sister were Metal based upon the context of the times... and they sure as hell paid their dues before breaking big, their documentary covers the 70s until they got signed about a decade later. Great stuff.

Checking out the album now, intrigued.
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get the fuck off my lawn.

Beer Bug Virus Spotify Playlist crafted by Nikarg and I. Feel free to tune in and add some pertinent metal tunes!
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03.11.2018 - 07:49
sbgmetal

I liked Become the Storm but not so much American Made or I Am the Hurricane, think ill give the record a listen now
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03.11.2018 - 10:04
nikarg

Written by BitterCOld on 03.11.2018 at 01:27

Dee is a swell guy, Twisted Sister were Metal based upon the context of the times... and they sure as hell paid their dues before breaking big, their documentary covers the 70s until they got signed about a decade later. Great stuff.

Checking out the album now, intrigued.

Don't know, I was a kid back then and thought TS were just a bunch of posers playing "rawk" music for mommies. Bizarrely I thought the same about WASP that I later came to love. And I have also come to like Dee as a person having read a few of his recent interviews. I will check out the doc you mention.

Let me know what you think about the album, the cd has been in my car for the last couple of months and I can't stop listening to it and singing along while driving.
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03.11.2018 - 10:10
nikarg

Written by sbgmetal on 03.11.2018 at 07:49

I liked Become the Storm but not so much American Made or I Am the Hurricane, think ill give the record a listen now

Become The Storm is the song I've listened to the most this year. The second part of the album is better I think, but I never skip any song and always play the whole cd.
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03.11.2018 - 18:23
Rating: 7
BitterCOld
The Ancient One
Written by nikarg on 03.11.2018 at 10:04


Don't know, I was a kid back then and thought TS were just a bunch of posers playing "rawk" music for mommies. Bizarrely I thought the same about WASP that I later came to love. And I have also come to like Dee as a person having read a few of his recent interviews. I will check out the doc you mention.

Let me know what you think about the album, the cd has been in my car for the last couple of months and I can't stop listening to it and singing along while driving.


They were well ahead of the curve. They formed in '72, ffs. Crystalized into the metal machine within a few years after that and Dee joining. Consider where metal was in the mid-70s. Their fans were called the Sick Motherfucking Friends of Twisted Sister.They'd already played well over 3000 gigs before the rabid fanbase was enough to eventually get them to a label. That was a struggle years in the making, no one wanted to touch them. "Stay Hungry" catapulted them to bigger fame... and saw them make their music more "mainstream", but even then it was still amongst the loudest shit you'd hear on the radio. If you were lucky.

Great documentary vid if you have time to kill. Covers formation until they hit big.


But metal fans annoy the shit out of me retconning stuff to fit modern definitions. Just because a modern gun does more damage than a 600 year old sword doesn't make the sword not a weapon any more.

Wanting to listen to the album now, but the wife is grading papers. File under "not a good idea".
----
get the fuck off my lawn.

Beer Bug Virus Spotify Playlist crafted by Nikarg and I. Feel free to tune in and add some pertinent metal tunes!
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05.11.2018 - 00:43
Lanthros

Ive allways been a a fan of Dees. This album is just plain a killer straight forward metal album. It does everything a metal album should.
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05.11.2018 - 12:46
Rating: 9
Cynic Metalhead
Paisa Vich Nasha
Written by BitterCOld on 03.11.2018 at 18:23

Written by nikarg on 03.11.2018 at 10:04


Wanting to listen to the album now, but the wife is grading papers. File under "not a good idea".


Just of out the context, if you may consider it, how about you help your wife in accumulating scores of every sheet while playing this disc in the background?
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18.11.2018 - 23:36
nikarg

Written by BitterCOld on 03.11.2018 at 18:23

Great documentary vid if you have time to kill. Covers formation until they hit big.

Finally found the time to watch it. Great doc and thank you for pointing it out. I still cannot stand their music but their story is very interesting nonetheless.
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