219. Deep Purple / Deepest Purple. 1980. 4.5/5.

When the band had finally fallen on its sword, and the dust had finally settled, this best-of came to remind everyone how great they had been. Or to make a bucketload of cash. Yeah, probably the second one.

You can't argue about the material that is on this album. They are all genuine classics. And as this was released on vinyl originally, there are only so many tracks you can put on. And I don't want to get into an argument as to what should have made this final cut. So I won't.

Rating : For the same reason as I have had before, you can't get full marks if it isn't a PERFECT best-of! 4.5/5.

218. Deep Purple / Deep Purple. 1969. 2.5/5

This was Purps third album, and the final album that contained their first line-up.

From the time this was completed, it was obvious that a change in musical direction was necessary, or certainly prevalent.
Deep Purple as an album is very much based around the keyboards of John Lord, with Ritchie Blackmore's distinctive guitaring also in the mix, but certainly not at the forefront of the music. Even for the 1960's this music is quite bland. It is very flower-power-ish, without a great deal to get excited about. I can certainly appreciate it for what it is and from the time it comes from, but it is not what excites me about Deep Purple.

Rating : An interesting page in Deep Purple history. 2.5/5.

217. Motley Crue / Decade Of Decadence. 1991. 4.5/5.

Another band that reached the ten year anniversary in 1991 was Motley Crue, and to celebrate they produced this best-of album.

Containing most of their greatest hits, a few of them remixed, and a couple of new tracks, this album is a pretty good compilation of their first ten years on the music scene. The fact that they haven't been able to produce anything to match it since is perhaps a little disconcerting.

Once again, however, I must have my objection noted on some of the track choices. Seriously – where is Too Young To Fall In Love? One of their greatest tracks, and it isn't here? Why couldn't the rather horrible version of the Sex Pistol's Anarchy In The U.K. have been left off? It would have improved this release a lot! Did the band choose these tracks, or the record company? That is just one of the disappointments. The live version of Kickstart My Heart? Why not just the studio version?

Despite that, this is a good release. Someone who wanted to know what Motley Crue are about could start here and be satisfied. But come on guys – get this best-of scenario RIGHT!! :)

Rating : At least they didn't CALL it a best-of! 4.5/5.

216. Slayer / Decade Of Aggression. 1991. 5/5.

Though Slayer had released a live album before this came along, it was not anywhere near the sheer magnitude that this comes across on.

Decade Of Aggression was released as a celebration of ten years of Slayer, and was recorded on the Seasons In The Abyss tour. There could be no better time to record a live album for Slayer. They were on a high, their albums were selling through the roof, and they were bloody heavy.

This is a spectacular analysis of the band live. They are powerful and fast, with barely a break between songs to catch breath. Dave just goes off on the drums, Kerry and Jeff's guitars are blinding, while Tommy stands at the front and belts out his vocals while banging away on the bass.
What impresses me the most about this release is that there are no overdubs. What you hear is what was played on stage. And you know that, because Tom stuffs up the lyrics in War Ensemble, and the band just keeps on going. Perhaps overdubs on live albums have their place, but you buy a live album to hear how the band really sounds, not how they sound in a studio.

Memories : The day I bought this, Bono was in the market for a stereo, so he had Kearo, Anthony, Shane, Holzy and me following him around to different stores as he tried to find a bargain. When it came to trying them out, he hadn't bought a CD that day – so it was Decade Of Aggression, pumping through the departments in David Jones, much to the chagrin of most of the customers on that Saturday afternoon.

Rating : One of the best three live albums ever released. A must have. 5/5.

215. Iron Maiden / Death On The Road. 2005. 5/5.

Given that Iron Maiden has basically admitted that they will never tour Australia again, this is as good as we are going to get it seems – a live album from every tour they do.

Yes, I am bitter about it. Surely the band is not short of cash. Surely they can afford a couple of shows at huge venues in Australia.

Anyway, I digress. Here is another Iron Maiden live album, and the quality is what you expect from Iron Maiden – fantastic. Recorded on the Dance Of Death tour, it contains numerous songs from that album – "Wildest Dreams", "Dance Of Death", "Rainmaker", "Paschendale", "No More Lies" and "Journeyman". While the album didn't always grab me, I must say that the songs do sound much better live, especially "Wildest Dreams", which I have always felt is rather weak.

OK – now the beef. Some of these songs surely need retiring from the live set. Only "Lord Of The Flies" remains from the Blaze era. If I was living in Europe, and seeing them every year (bastards!) I'd be sick to death of "Fear Of The Dark" and "Iron Maiden" and "Run To The Hills" and "Hallowed Be Thy Name" – and perhaps even "The Trooper"! Come on guys, inject some new blood into the setlist!

Anyway, get over it Bill! This is another great Maiden live album, showcasing their amazing skills and talents. They are still the best around, the band that everyone must look up to as the greatest of all time.

Rating:  Another brilliant encapsulation of a live performance of this magnificent band.  5/5.

214. Scorpions / Deadly Sting : The Mercury Years. 1997. 4/5.

This is a 2 disc best-of compilation put out by Mercury after the Scorpions had move onto better pasture at another record company.

Best-of is such a subjective term, and for me, it doesn't really hold total water here. Though most of the songs on these two discs are great songs, there are some that have been left off, for whatever reasons that may be, and for that reason, it cannot be given full marks.
However, it is a worthy listen. Just not an ultimate greatest hits package, if that is what you are looking for.

Rating : Some of the best the Scorpions have released. 4/5.

213. Deep Purple / Days May Come And Days May Go : The 1975 California Rehearsals. 2000. 3/5.

A series of songs recorded during Deep Purple's rehearsals for the big California shows they put on in 1975 (the album of which has been reviewed earlier)

This to me is of historical significance only. I'm not a big fan of the long jam sessions some of these artists went on with. I'm not saying they aren't clever or intricate. They just bore me as a whole.
This is the kind of album you may listen to once or twice, and only ever bring it out again to reflect on with friends or new recruits. That's pretty much what I'll be doing.

Rating : Historical. 3/5.

212. Night Ranger / Dawn Patrol. 1982. 4/5.

Night Ranger had formed in 1979, with three of the members having been in the funk rock band Rubicon, those being lead vocalist and bass guitarist Jack Blades, co-lead vocalist and drummer Kelly Keagy and lead guitarist Brad Gillis. In 1980 former Montrose member Alan Fitzgerald joined on keyboard and synth, and he suggested adding a second guitarist to the group to fill out the sound, which prompted Jeff Watson being drafted in for the position. At this stage the band had been called Stereo, which they then changed to Ranger. However, another band called The Rangers fought them for copyright over this name as they became more popular and signed a record contract. At this time Blades had written a song called “Night Ranger”, and so they decided that this would become the name of the group.
Night Ranger had secured opening act positions with both ZZ Top and Ozzy Osbourne (with Brad Gillis filling in on lead guitar for Ozzy for the recently deceased Randy Rhoads) and were in the process of promoting this soon-to-be-released album. As a band they were in a position that gave them a strength when it came to writing and performing. The band contained two main songwriters in Blades and Keagy, both of whom also swapped and shared lead vocals for the tracks. The resulting mix gave the songs on the album a different focus depending on who the main writer of the song was and who was the main vocalist on the track. And this mix was also complemented by the ability of the band to not only write a great hard rock track, but also a popular rock ballad as well. Their sound was more commercial than contemporaries Y&T which enabled them to corner both ends of the market when it came to their target audience.

For a debut album, this crosses a line between several distinct genre possibilities, depending on just what your music preferences are. Looking back at it from such a long distance in the past, there’s little doubt that while it isn’t AOR or easy listening in the way that many 1970’s rock bands generated, it has its roots there from the band’s formative years. That base then incorporates a harder rock sound that bands like Kiss had utilised at the time, while also integrating the kind of rock ballad basis that was utilised in order to get airplay on radio stations worldwide in that era.
And Night Ranger had a terrific formation to accomplish all of those things. With twin guitars, and two players who both wanted to showcase their skills on their instrument, meant that duelling solos and harmonising gave their hard rock songs exactly what they needed to appeal to that market – the market I was a part of. Then they also had the great crooning vocals of both Blades and Keagy, with more injection of the synth and the rock ballad guitar that emphasised those tracks in the direction they wanted them to go in order to appeal to that market.
And the ballad tracks certainly work in that favour. “Sing Me Away” and “Young Girl in Love” are written by both Blades and Keagy, in the tradition of rock ballads, with both sung by Keagy who appears to be the main vocalist on these types of tracks. And they do the job the band is looking for well, and given they are spaced between the rockier songs the album holds itself together well, whether they are your kind of songs or not. In between these tracks come songs such as “At Night She Sleeps” and “Call My Name” and “Eddie’s Coming Out Tonight” which find the nice middle ground, good solid rock songs that play their part in making the foundation of the album.
All of these combine with what, for me at least, are the starring songs here. “Play Rough” is a tough talking track, “Penny” is perhaps the second best guitar track on the album with both Gillis and Watson freeforming across the song and Kelly Keagy belting out the lyrics. And “Can’t Find Me A Thrill” has both vocalists singing and trading vocals which is terrific. They are bookended by two great songs in the title track “Night Ranger” that closes out the album, and the opening track “Don’t Tell Me You Love Me”, with the great opening riff and drum beat, Blades great vocals and the scorching guitars. It’s the song that pulled me headlong into this band.

At times during my life with music there have come along albums that I have gained an obsession with, healthy or unhealthy. Just every so often one would crop up, and I wouldn’t stop listening to it for, not just weeks or months, but even into years. “Dawn Patrol” was one of these. In 1986 we had an American exchange student turn up in our year for a few short weeks. With him he brought his current listening material. One of the bands that he had albums of was Night Ranger, and this album was the one I heard first. And was the one that grabbed me. And it was from that opening track, from Brad Gillis’s opening guitar twiddle, the combining of Kelly Keagy’s drum beat, and into the song. It was the lure that grabbed me and dragged me in. And then everything that followed felt perfect. A great combination of the hard rock and the rock ballad, awesome guitars – just awesome throughout really – from Brad Gillis and Jeff Watson, the great atmospheric keys from Alan Fitzgerald which don’t overpower but add in each song, Kelly Keagy’s brilliant drumming along with his vocals, and the dominating bass lines and also vocals from Jack Blades.
I had this album on a C90 cassette with the band’s second album “7 Wishes” on the other side, and it stayed in my car cassette player (once I got my licence, which probably wasn’t until about nine months after I got this album) and at home for longer than I can remember. It did eventually die a violent, chewed up, irretrievably lost death from overplaying, which should give you an idea of how much I played it. And it has always been a favourite as a result. Indeed, all of Night Ranger’s first four albums are favourites, but this one has always had a special place. And in many ways I still surprise people when I sing songs off it, because they don’t even know who Night Ranger are. But my kids know that opening track of this album, because I played the video clip to them over and over as they grew up, bouncing them off to sleep on my knee as I serenaded them with one of my favourite songs of all time.

211. Pink Floyd / The Dark Side Of The Moon. 1973. 1.5/5.

If you are not a diehard Pink Floyd fan, it may surprise you that “The Dark Side of the Moon” is Pink Floyd’s eighth studio album, and while they were successful, it was by no means a band that had outstanding success, not that you would have imagined looking back from today. Coming out of the 1960’s, their early work had a lot of the instrumentation freeform progressive exploration on stage and then on their albums that many of the same types of bands fiddled with at that point in their careers. Rather than have structured verses, choruses and instrument breaks, the songs would flow in such a way that the structure was very loose and fluid, and what was put down on vinyl was not necessarily how they were played on stage.
Most of this album was written and then performed on stage for almost 12 months before it was finally brought into the studio and committed to vinyl. Now that’s not unusual for bands in the 1970’s to play new material in concert well before they actually release it on an album. It rarely happens in the modern age, and as a concert goer I’d be ambivalent about going to see a band play the material I know, and then get hit with several songs that I didn’t know. But, certainly in the instance of this album, the band wanted to find a way to get the songs right, and the best way to do it was to playing them on stage, and finding a way to tighten them to the point that they were happy.
They then spent a period of 8 or 9 months in the studio at different times recording the album. It utilises many different concepts and recording techniques, as well as spoken word in places throughout to help connect tracks and ideas. It acts as a concept album, and according to Roger Waters, who provided all of the lyrics on the album, the five tracks on each side reflect various stages of human life, beginning and ending with a heartbeat, exploring the nature of the human experience and, according to Waters, empathy. And then, once recorded and released, it began its climb to immortality.

Is the psychedelic 1960’s and early 1970’s more your scene of music? Is it something you have to have lived through, in order to get the most out of the music? Are there forms of music that you really probably needed to be on LSD or something similar to be able to see the colours an album releases to enjoy it in its best light? Or does it simply come down to the fact that there are genres of music you will love, and others that you will be ambivalent to?
For a start, this album has a lot synths, and keyboards, and looped effects going on. “Speak to Me”, “On the Run” and “Any Colour You Like” are the instrumentals on the albums, all of them a bit ‘spacey’ for wont of a better term. They are connectors between the other songs, adding (I guess) the colour of the music to the album, but even the songs have similar effects to them. Richard Wright switches between the Hammond organ, electric piano, normal everyday piano and various synths that tend to dominate most of the album. And this is what Pink Floyd had always done well in their previous albums.
And the fact is that the effect on the album when David Gilmour’s guitar does come in, and Nick Mason’s drums, and Roger Waters bass guitar, then it booms through your speakers and makes an immediate impact on what has been produced.
And as I mentioned earlier, there are songs, or at least partial songs from this album, that just about everyone would recognise, even if you don’t know the album itself. The clocks from the start of “Time”, and that initial impact of guitar and Gilmour’s vocals in the middle of the track. The cash registers and the opening lyrics from “Money”, the vocals of Clare Torry on “The Great Gig in the Sky”, and the middle serenading of “Brain Damage”, that makes you feel you are floating in outer space while listening to it. These are iconic pieces that have infiltrated popular culture to the point that they are recognisable.
It is an album that still sells, and no doubt will again with the 50th anniversary editions being released in all formats. And it will continue to be held up as one of the greatest albums ever released, for its innovation and uniqueness in a time where these types of albums could be a dime a dozen, but missing the obvious time and energy spent in shaping the design of the album, from beginning to end, ensuring each piece flowed into the next, with lyrics discussing the topics they faced being expertly formed and drawn by the music written to highlight them.
But... despite all of this... what if you just are not attracted to it? What if despite what all the so-called experts say about this album that has sold more than 45 million copies worldwide, you just can’t hear it?

I’ll admit right here that I have never owned a copy of this album, and will only ever own a copy of this album if someone gifts it to me. And I have never been a Pink Floyd fan, even though whenever I meet people I don’t know and they discover the range of bands that I love and listen to, they say “yeah, how about Pink Floyd, hey? The Wall, Dark Side of the Moon! Awesome!!” And once I state my ambivalence towards the band and this album, I tend to be derided heavily and then they move on. Which is always for the best.
Zeppelin and Sabbath and Purple from this same era had the guitar, the iconic guitars of Page, Iommi and Blackmore. And that was what drew me to those bands. For the most part, Pink Floyd didn’t have that, though Gilmour has shown he can play when he needs to, and it is those moments on this album that really prick my ears up, when he actually plays a riff. But those are the small highlights that pop up along the way, rather than dominating the album and being the driving force. And I know full well that the acquaintances of mine who listened to this album constantly during my high school years were either tripping on acid or smoking bongs in dim basements somewhere, which is not something I spent any time doing. But, listening to the album, I can only hazard a guess that it would be a different experience listening to this while under that kind of influence.
So given that this is all the case, you can probably imagine that “The Dark Side of the Moon” is not up there with my favourite albums. And over the last month, leading up to this anniversary and this episode, I would have listened to this album more than the previous fifty years combined. And I haven’t had a problem with it being on and listening to it. It isn’t an album that I hate or loathe, or am even ambivalent to. Simply put, it just isn’t my style of music. It doesn’t hold a great deal of interest for me. I can’t think of any situation where I would want to grab this album and put it on, to salvage a bad day or enhance a good one. It just isn’t in my ballpark of music style or genre.
So – happy anniversary to an iconic album, one that millions around the world will be celebrating. An in the long run was an excuse for me to discover if my thoughts on this album had changed in any way. Spolier alert – they haven’t.

210. Helloween / The Dark Ride. 2000. 5/5.

By the turn of the century had arrived, Helloween had managed to pull out of the spiral it had suffered from at the conclusion of the Kiske/Schwichtenberg era of the band after the much maligned ‘Chameleon” album, and through the return to their basic structures with the recruitment of Andi Deris and Uli Kusch, they had brought out two albums in “Master of the Rings” and “The Time of the Oath” that brought back the fan base by returning to what they did best, and proving that they were still the master of their own destiny. Alongside Michael Weikath and Marcus Grosskopf and also Roland Grapow, Helloween reversed a downward trend that would have seen lesser bands fold, and yet they climbed back to the top of the power metal tree and continued to ride the wave even as those who had been inspired by them and arrived in the 1990’s decade themselves tried to not only emulate them but pass them by.
Their 1998 album “Better Than Raw” had begun to push the boundaries again, but rather than to a more poppy sound that the band had followed with “Pink Bubbles Go Ape” and “Chameleon”, this album pushed a little harder to be more of a slightly heavier tone while still drawing majorly on the power metal tones they had returned with in the past five years. While the album was still well received, I appeared not everything was as solid in the Helloween camp as they would have imagined.
Some tension arose over the collaboration that two of their members, Grapow and Kusch, had begun to discuss. Away from the business of Helloween, these two had begun to consider putting together a side project, one to work on in the down time from Helloween. The problem arose – depending on which story you choose to believe – because it was felt that they were beginning to pull away from the demands of Helloween and were putting more time and energy into this proposed side project. Grapow and Kusch denied and continue to deny this was the case. Weikath, Deris and Grosskopf though pointed to the fact that Grapow’s involvement in the writing process of the band had deteriorated to almost nothing, and yet he was working on this other side project a fair bit. At the time there was an unsettled atmosphere within the group as a result.
All of this makes what the band produced for their ninth studio album an interesting task to break down. Because from what the band had produced before this album, this was a fairly major starkly different move. And given the tension that appeared to be occurring prior to this album, and then what came after it was released, and the differing stories that continued to fly around, you would think this had been a complete disaster. And yet, the year 2000’s release of “The Dark Ride” is something that is definitely NOT that. Even if it its place within the Helloween discography is still hotly debated by fans and band members alike, it most definitely is NOT a disaster.

There is without question a darker tone in the music and the lyrics on this album. It is what sets it apart from what the band had produced before this in its career. Helloween was the height of speed and power metal at its peak up until 1989, and after the well publicised fall had more or less regained their roots through the mid 1990’s with the release of “Master of the Rings” and “The Time of the Oath”, and become the power metal band was of the genre that they had helped create. “Better Than Raw” had twisted that slightly, but the arrival of “The Dark Ride” brought a whole new tone to the band’s sound, musically and also in the starkness of the black and white cover of the album.
In looking at this album in depth, it is important to note that, despite the rumbling conflict that was a part of the band regarding writing prior to this album, everyone but Marcus Grosskopf contributes to the songs on this album. And you need to look at those writing contributions to see where the album heads, and to try and find where and how the album goes in the direction it does. By looking at the composers of the songs on the album, there is some cause to see where the direction lay.
Michael Weikath wrote “All Over the Nations” and “Salvation”, which are arguably the most mainline Helloween tracks of the album. They are wonderfully toned Helloween songs, the lovely speedy tunes, “Salvation” especially is an uplifting track both lyrically and musically, in the best traditions of what Helloween do. It is another of the best examples of a Weikath song, along with the happy guitars throughout the solo section as well. Andi’s vocals are superbly attuned, the melodic harmony through the middle of the verses are just fantastic, almost offering a combined sing off between each other. I have often wondered in the years since why Roland rarely appears as a support vocalist on the albums, because he has a great voice, and when he sings live it is terrific. “All over the Nations” is again another atypical Weikath track in the post “Chameleon” years. Both solid tracks on the album, both drawn from the same well as the tracks had been over the previous 5-6 years.
As had been becoming the case, the majority of the tracks on the album have the design of Andi Deris, one of his strengths, which is why he had been brought into the band as Michael Kiske’s replacement. Here though he contributes five of the songs plus the instrumental opening piece to the album, by far his heaviest workload since coming into the band. His two tracks that take up the middle of the album are the ones that bring their own path to the album. “Mirror Mirror” takes on the darker side of the oft quoted tale, with Andi’s excellent lyrics delving into the deepening madness of the protagonist as they search the mirror for the answers they seek with the mood of the music conveying that to the listener. It's a well composed and constructed song, with Andi’s layering of his vocals to again almost provide a light and dark interpretation within them of the song’s story being fantastic. This is followed by “If I Could Fly”, the first single released from the album, one that moves between the synth and the distorted guitar, the softly sung lyrics to the more forceful higher strains of the powerful chorus. The lyrics themselves are uplifting, of the protagonist who is looking to better themselves, to rise from their position and chase their dreams. It is a positive message, offered in a slower tempo than most Helloween tracks, and with that transition between light and dark musically. Beyond the tour for this album, this pretty much remained the only song that the band kept in their setlist.
Andi’s final three songs on the album come back-to-back in the back half of the album. “I Live for Your Pain” is an absolute ripper, and here there is more of the dark side of the album and of Andi’s contribution. Musically it follows the track that precedes it with the opening of just bass riff and drums, heavy guitar riffs, moodily sung verses into the spitting pre-choruses and then the hard charging chorus, and riveting guitar solo section. It sets up the song to be a powerhouse track in the change the band creates for this release. Andi Deris, when speaking about the background of the song, said: “This] is a typical relationship thing, when two people actually love each other, but love and hate are so nearby. You can have the biggest love in your life, and the next day you have the biggest war with that person. I think you can only have such a war when you really hate yourself, because honestly you love yourself. It’s such a big feeling that goes on in a negative and positive way between two persons. My question in this song is – how can it be that the person you love the most could be your biggest enemy when you have trouble?”
“We Damn the Night” contains a lot of spiritual imagery in its lyrics, against channelling the themes of dark and light to the album, the music itself again includes periods of brighter scenes along with descending to the depths of the dark. Andi has often used these themes in his lyrics, but not with the addition of the heavier darker themes in the music. More of this follows with the more epically transcribed visions of “Immortal”, Andi’s third of his triumvirate of songs here. Those discussions of light and dark remain lyrically, with: “Tonight we are stars, stars inside the nights of ache, love and hate, hope and shade, take you away, I will take you away”. Musically it is very much drawing on the emotional high points with more keys and synth driving the singing underneath, before the guitars return to prove their worth through the middle of the song. All of these three songs show a devised theme of lyrics and music, one that follows the title of the album. Is there are reason for this? Well, let’s talk about that shortly.
That leaves two songwriters and their contributions to the album, and it is their contributions that seem to be the ones that gain the main criticism or applause, depending on your enjoyment or disappointment of the album. Roland Grapow offers two writing credits on the album despite some internal criticism, and both very much draw on the darker side of the album. “Escalation 666” on reflection feels very much like a stab at his bandmates – which would not be the last time Grapow would use that motivation for lyrical essays. Line such as “Almost everyday you put yourself high on a shelf, whatever you do, wherever you go, never turn my back on you” and “Deceit and malice, every smile hides betrayal and greed, hypocrisy, we've been like brothers, now I hold out my hands to a blood - to a bloodless soul”. How do you try and justify those lyrics to your bandmates? Anyway, the music is also dripping with the same menace that Andi sings the song with, and though the song seems promoted as an attack by the devil or devil’s savant, it seems like it is directed differently. Roland’s other contribution is the title track, the epic closer “The Dark Ride”, which lyrically Grapow sins his tale of good and evil, the traps lain for all who choose to take the ride, the desire for all and yet the light at the end, even as it is stolen away as darkness descends. This is a fabulously composed song, and though Helloween has done amazing closing tracks prior to this album, this is most certainly the darkest. It does mirror the heavy and emotional ride of those tracks, but more than anything else it offers each member of the band to showcase their wares, rums, bass, guitars and vocals. They all offer their best motives throughout this track, and it brings it to its wonderful conclusion.
That leaves Uli Kusch and his barn-burning crack-the-sky incredible final contributions to the band Helloween – the incredible opening tack “Mr Torture” and arguably the best Helloween track since “Keeper of the Seven Keys Part II”, “The Departed (Sun is Going Down)”. “Mr Torture” is unlike any Helloween song before it. The keys and bass guitar rumbling opening before the drums and guitars enter to build to the first burst of vocals crushing this song through the speakers, the power of the tidal wave crashing through with that opening riff underneath and Andi starts the tale. The layered backing vocals through the chorus, the powerful drumming from Uli through the whole song, the guitar solo spiralling down the fretboard. This is a truly amazing opening track after the opening instrumental intro. It introduces the album with the incredible power it needs to say “Here we are, we are Helloween, but this is something out there, something new, and something awesome”. Which, is arguably Uli’s best ever contribution to the band, until you get the “The Departed (Sun is Going Down)”. The opening riff, then Andi’s opening salvo of vocals as the bass guitar comes in underneath followed by Uli’s drums – and then the crash into the song. It is so menacing, so moodily magnificent as it builds through the verse into the pre-chorus, the chant that settles alongside Andi’s singing, and then into the chorus itself. For me, still, shivers down the spine stuff. All of this happens in such an unassuming mid-tempo that draws you along into the track. And Marcus’s bassline in that pre-chorus underneath, you almost wouldn’t notice it if you weren’t listening to it, but it is so incredibly wonderful how it changes the whole focus of the song… it is amazing.
With the album seemingly following a ritual theme of black and white, of darkness and light, with the writing all seeming to go along with that, why then was there an uncomfortableness about the album by the band once the tour was completed? Marcus Grosskopf, in an interview with Metal Rules in 2011, well after this period, perhaps can shine some light on that: “THE DARK RIDE was kind of constructed, with everyone telling us to try this, let’s do that, you know. It’s a good album, but it’s a very difficult way to make records when someone is always getting on your nerves”. This was left to believe that it was Roland and Uli who pushed for this, but the other person who helped with the production on the album was a guy called Roy Z, whose success with Bruce Dickinson and Rob Halford has been noted elsewhere on this podcast. Now, if all of the songs were mostly skewed in one direction, lyrically and musically, and there are three writers on the album who have headed in this direction, then that would also need another guiding hand in that decision making process. Was it Roy Z? Is this what Marcus actually meant in his comment? Since the album, it has been left for the pressure to be borne by Uli and Roland. But when you have another member in Andi who write five songs for the album that do also head in the same kind of direction… well… there has to be an agreement there somehow… doesn’t there? In essence – shouldn’t the questions be; who composed the songs on the album? In which case, who was responsible for the direction of the album? And then, if there was disharmony or a disappointment in what was happening, why does the imbalance in those things seem to not be the way you would expect if that was the case?

What is it that makes this album so controversial, so ‘love it or hate it’, so black and white like the cover of the album, so dark or so light? Unlike “Chameleon” which is more universally unliked, whenever discussion arise about “The Dark Ride”, the opinions are almost universally ‘yeah I love that album’ or ‘nah I dislike that album’. Very black and white. A lot of fans praised the heavier direction and dissection of “Better Than Raw”, and yet it is an album I have never really cottoned onto. That was where I felt the band went off on a tangent – several in fact – and while it is nowhere near the “Chameleon” class of average, it is an album I don’t revisit often.
And yet, “The Dark Ride” has an allure that dragged me in from the start. Is it a dark magic? Or did it just offer me exactly what I wanted at the time? I remember travelling to Sydney to Utopia Records with the sole intent of buying this album. I wanted nothing but this album. It was an interesting feeling, especially on the back of how I felt about “Better Than Raw”. But the publicising for the album had been that it was going to have a heavier sound, and all I could think was ’Helloween but heavier? How can that not be good?!’ And I bought it. And I was transfixed from the very beginning. “Mr Torture” blew me away. “Mirror Mirror” was sinister. “Salvation” was pure Weikath magic. “The Departed” just made my heart stop, it was that incredible. The follow up “I Live for Your Pain” follows it perfectly. And the closing title track was epically brilliant. And so I put it on again. And again. And again. The year 2000 had offered me some great albums, and some great comeback stories. “The Dark Ride” followed me everywhere though 2001. It became an obsession. I tracked down a bootleg of a gig the band played in Osaka on 2 March 2001, a gig where there were eight songs played off this album. I love it. And the album just never grows old. I played it everywhere I was for well over 12 months.
I have now had this album out again for the better part of two months. I somehow missed its release date anniversary, and it has still been on my CD player and work playlist since then, because I knew I had to do an episode on this album – but I had to make sure that I did it justice. I know even as I record this that I haven’t done that. Because it is so hard to give an album that has meant so much to me, that I hold in such high regard, the justice it deserves. Also knowing that most of you listeners will not feel the same way I do about it, that many will not only insist it isn’t very good, that it does indeed suck. And I think trying to find a way to make you feel that it DOESN’T suck, knowing all the while that I can’t do that. So I have it my best shot here. I have offered up a reasonable assessment of the songs this album contains and tried to express what makes them so great to me. Knowing agreement will not be coming. And as always, that is fine, because we all have our own tastes, not only of music genres or of bands, of those individual band’s discographies. And I most assuredly respect that. I have argued my case, and you know where I stand.
On reflection of the album, and in the wake of the dismissal of both Roland Grapow and Uli Kusch from Helloween after the tour to support this album, and the absolute ignoring of all material except for Andi Deris’s “If I Could Fly” in live gigs in the years since that tour concluded, as well as the silence in discussion from the band members on what occurred with those dismissals, it makes for a more interesting dissection into the songs on the album taking all of that into the case. Helloween maintained that Grapow not pulling his weight in the writing after earlier albums, the side project of Grapow and Kusch which meant they felt they weren’t concentrating on their main gig, and the difference in their musical direction compared to what the other members of the band wished to head in, contributed to their dismissals from the band. For their side, both denied this and say it was used against them when they wanted them out of the band. Whichever way you go, it was very unfortunate from a Helloween fans point of view, who was also a massive fan of that album. Helloween moved on and have continued to release albums to this very day, though none ever with the same heaviness and darker aspirations as “The Dark Ride”. Roland and Uli formed their proposed side project into their main band which they called “Masterplan”, and hired Jorn Lande to be their lead vocalist, releasing two of the best power metal albums of the 2000’s with their self titled debut and the follow up “Aeronautics”. Perhaps in the long run, we got the best of both worlds.