In 1999 Ward met up with WWE wrestler Chris Jericho backstage at a wrestling show. The two bonded over their love of 1980s heavy metal, and Ward invited Jericho to join his cover band. Jericho did participate in a few shows but had no intention of joining the project permanently. Despite only supposed to be a fun side project, the band was courted by Metal Blade Records. Jericho became a permanent fixture, going under the name of Moongoose McQueen, a schtick he stuck to during interviews, refusing to acknowledge that he was Chris Jericho, while Jericho in interviews would say that he loved Moongoose and Fozzy. In true Spinal Tap tradition, the band changed their name to Fozzy and filmed a mockumentary that aired on MTV. The show provided a fictional back story about the band, alleging that the members of Fozzy had in fact written many of the more popular 1980s metal songs, though their record company forced them to move to Japan to be huge rock stars, but the company went out of business, leaving them stranded for 20 years, while all their demos were snatched and recorded by other bands. These were the songs that they eventually brought together to record and release on their first mainstream worldwide album release. However, the album featured two original songs by Fozzy, "End of Days" and "Feel the Burn", in which it was implied that the band had just recently written these songs and other bands hadn't had the chance to "rip" these songs off yet.
It was under this cover story that the band came together to record a debut album, one that the record company thought would be huge on the back of their expected popularity with the wrestling fans they felt would no doubt rush out to buy it. But as with the fabled backstory of Fozzy, things are never quite that simple.
Apart from the novelty reason for getting this album, what you get as a part of the bargain is a whole bunch of really good heavy metal songs with, for the most part, terrific cover interpretations from this band. There’s no doubt most people would come in to this for Jericho or Rich Ward, but once you arrive it is more than worth the effort.
The opening with Dio’s “Stand Up and Shout” utilises a faux live setting that the band did with “King of Rock and Roll” on a later album, and the callback works nicely here. A great version of the song. Some of the song versions have good parts of them, but are then less than brilliant for other parts of the song. Take for Instance “Stay Hungry” by Twisted Sister. The first half of the song is fantastic. Jericho gives us a great vocal, the band are on song. But once we reach the final verse into the final chorus, Jericho goes above and beyond with his scream which doesn’t quite fit the song. That part has plenty of emotion and power in a normal setting, and raising that is pretty much a given for anyone who sings along with it. But the vocal here gets a bit out of hand which brings it back in any estimation.
On the good side though, there are a couple. The version here of Krokus’s “Eat the Rich” is fantastic, and I’m almost willing to say that it is better than Krokus’s original version. It is played at a good clip, and Jericho gives a great alternative vocal performance that lifts the song to a new height. I love the version of Iron Maiden’s “The Prisoner”, along with the band doing their own version of the opening monologue. They sound like they are having fun with it, and that then moves into the track itself. Jericho is no Dickinson but he does a great job here, especially the harmony in the chorus and anyone who has heard the band’s version of “The Evil That Men Do” on a later Maiden tribute album would hopefully agree Jericho does a great job on that track too. Worth looking for if you haven’t already heard it. Also here on “The Prisoner” I like how the band don’t do a note for note replay of the track, they add their own style to the solo section, (playing into the story that they claim they wrote this as the original version) which works great. Rich Ward nails Mick Mars’s guitaring on their version of “Live Wire” that comes across here as the hard rocking anthem it should always be considered as. Tuned down a touch which gives Jericho the chance to sing in his tough range rather than trying to mimic Vince Neil’s high-pitched vocals gives this song a heavier feel and works excellently for this release.
The first original track “End of Days” follows, and that Rich Ward guitar riff sound and Jericho vocal style that would soon be replicated on future albums comes to the fore immediately here. As the first indication of what these two could write in their own realm, it is interesting to go back and listen to it 25 years later. Instructive even. You can hear the basis of what they wrote on “All That Remains” and “Chasing the Grail” right here, and it is still a really good song all these years later.
Then we crash into a sizzling version of Ozzy Osbourne’s “Over the Mountain”, where you can hear the joy in Rich Ward’s guitaring as he plays along with Randy Rhodes’s original playbook. The original is such an iconic song that it is a brave move to create your own cover of the song, but my word Fozzy do a dramatically brilliant job of it here. Jericho doesn’t try to imitate Ozzy, he gives his own beautiful version of the vocals, all of which makes this a top shelf heavy track on this album. Just for good measure, they follow that up by taking on the Scorpions' “Blackout”, another iconic song that it takes a brave band to come out and offer their own version, but again they do an awesome job here. Jericho is not afraid to change the way he sings the song from Klaus Meine, and his changes actually sound really good, and the guitar riffs accentuated here on the heavier side bring it all together again. The second original track “Feel the Burn” (no prizes for guessing where the title may have come from) mirrors the other original track, but is not quite in the same category as that one. The album comes to its conclusion with Judas Priest’s “Riding on the Wind”, not an easy song for Jericho to close out on, but the enthusiasm shown by the band on the song itself is infectious. Jericho stretches his vocal chords in impressive style to recreate Halford’s performance on the original, and actually does a really good job of making this version another terrific one, and a great way to play out the album.
For many of us who have been amateur musicians who have put together bands with our mates to get together and jam to our favourite songs, this album is a dream scenario. Go into a studio, lay down a handful of songs from the bands' you love to listen to, and then release it on an album. Awesome. What more could you ask for? A couple of your own original songs in there as well, to hopefully create some interest in your own work so you can expand this in the future? Why not?
This album originally came to me via my heavy metal music dealer, who while he had had an obsession with wrestling in his teens as much as the rest of us had, had seen that grow with the birth of his two sons who also enjoyed the scene. His discovery that Y2J had released an album of songs that we had all grown up adoring sent him into a slight frenzy, and so he had passed that on to me as well. And to be straight to the point, I really enjoyed not only the songs that they chose to cover, but the way they covered them. Offering up their own interpretations of the songs – not a million miles off how the original band had produced them, but enough to be a point of difference – made for an entertaining listen. Is it something that could last forever? Well, no, it couldn’t. As with most cover albums, there is an initial period where this is listenable, until such time that you just refer back to the original artist for the songs. That’s a pretty standard thing, at least for me.
But here’s the twist. Pulling this album back out again this week for a revival in the stereo, it has been a fun and rollicking time all over again. Not only for the amazingly great songs the band chose to cover, but for the two original track that they produced as a part of it. They stand today as the path forward, the one the band eventually took in becoming a ‘real’ band, one that produced their own songs for each album. And pretty good albums at that. Of course that it down the ways a bit, but if you want to jump ahead and check out “All That Remains” and “Chasing the Grail” - you should. They are well worth the effort.
Beyond that – enjoy this album for what it is. It is fun, and Jericho sings better than you will ever imagine he would.
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