Cool material, but not flattering to any parties involved...
Heavy Metal Hero | USA | 06/18/2005
(3 out of 5 stars)
"Kudos to Amazon for mentioning Marty Friedman in this CD's title, but sadly, there will probably still a fair share of ignoramuses who blindly buy this thinking it's the Janet Gardner glam rock band. It must be stressed that this Vixen has nothing to do with trendy, aesthetically inclined '80s rock.
I do love older compilations of rare material like this, so it's nice that it was released, but at the same time, it has me worried that, coupled with overlap from some of the Hawaii bootlegs, a lot of early Vixen/Aloha stuff won't see the light of day. This CD only focuses on Kim La Chance's material with the band, and even then, doesn't include quite all of the early Vixen demo tracks. The "Made in Hawaii" EP has already been pressed on CD format, albeit as a bootleg. Truthfully, a big multiple-CD compendium of all Vixen/Aloha/Hawaii stuff (maybe with some of the early Deuce tracks with Marty) would have been a lot nicer, but less realistic.
I'll be honest--I don't like much of Kim La Chance's vocal work for Vixen at all. Her best performances were certainly for Malisha's material. She's certainly charismatic and over-the-top in her delivery, but it would really befit more of a hard rock act. "Living In Sin," the best Vixen song, is proof positive of this; La Chance does a lot of bizarre vocal and tonal influctuations that don't mesh well with the song. But coupled with revised lyrics, the Gary St. Pierre-fronted version on the first Hawaii LP is an absolute U.S. metal anthem that crushes everything else that any Friedman-related project has ever done. And as I said, having some of the Aloha material would have provided a nice counterpoint (sadly, I think the only Aloha stuff on digital format is a single track on Metal Massacre II). Liza Ruiz gives a much more generic and traditional delivery than La Chance, maybe a bit like Betsy of Bitch, but it fits the music a lot better.
Musically, this is a bit of a mixed bag as well. Some of the songs seem more rooted in a hard rock type of presentation--"Rocking Me Hard," for example, sounds like a metalized Joan Jett type of anthem, and on songs like this La Chance's vocals actually fit well. The Animals' cover "House of the Rising Sun" is probably the best song on the CD, just out of sheer novelty value. But other material, especially "Living In Sin," is firmly in line with a lot of the US Judas Priest-inspired metal of the early '80s and shares a lot with early Metal Blade and Shrapnel bands. The unusual thing is that there doesn't seem to be much of a detectable NWOBHM influence, which is odd especially for such an early US metal band.
Friedman's guitar work here is excellent, and the instrumental "Beg for Mercy" is a definite precursor to Cacophony. I think Marty was always tasteful enough not to descend into shredding wankery, but even when his speedy solos represent drastic time changes in some of the more mid-tempo Vixen songs, it's well done. Overall the demo tracks have more of a rawer feel to them and I find them a bit more interesting, even though the EP tracks exhibit much better songwriting (but again, I already have the EP, so I'm a bit biased since I'm used to those songs).
Those familiar with Vixen (or Hawaii) will probably want to pick this up. Demo discs can of course be positive or negative, and represent material untarnished by album production and overpoplishing, or represent versions of songs whose full potential hasn't been tapped yet. Unfortunately, this CD firmly represents the latter, so most of this disc's desirability stems from novelty and nostalgia factors. While the demos and EP tracks here aren't bad at all, to pretend that Friedman didn't better them with Hawaii (when speaking of redone Vixen songs or about Hawaii's original material versus Vixen's original material) would be an outright lie.
"
Awesome... marty friedman sucks!
Rabbit Head | ny, usa | 02/04/2007
(5 out of 5 stars)
"no he's good.. but on this, he just sounds like any guitar player from the era.. so its retarded that his name is featured .... and the cover art is gross.... but ANYWAYS, the music on here is great... totally classic early 80's metal, and the singer has class.. she's the real reason to get this cd... the songs are well done, and seriously, you can tell by the years this was recorded (83-ish) and the song-titles that this is good... if you like old metal that has THAT feeling, NWOBHM and the early Metal Massacre comps, then you'll probly like this"
Track Listings (13) - Disc #1