Juggernaut – Baptism under Fire

Juggernaut – Baptism under Fire

This band that was formed in 1984 in San Antonio, Texas, United States of America and released its current debut in 1986 may be completely unknown to you or you may have found it in some of your internet searches. I personally happened to find their vinyl at a very good price and decided to take the risk and get it. In addition to the good price, the fact that the well-known Bobby Jarzombek, who we learned from his participation in the metal god Rob Halford's personal band and FATES WARNING, contributes to this. Of course, the fact that a well-known musician participates in a band does not automatically make it worth talking about or worthy of attention.

The band was sonically characterized as playing technical thrash metal, but personally I think that description probably does it no justice. My guess is that the band moves musically between US power metal and of course technical speed/thrash metal. Sonically, the band on their first record reminded me of bands like SANCTUARY, OVERKILL in the "Taking Over" period or ATTACKER in the "The Second Coming" period. The disc, that is, has the typical characteristics of the US power/thrash metal releases of the time (mid 80's) and maybe for this reason it went unnoticed at that time. Still, although it is a typical release of the era, it has good moments and I believe that the fan of this particular style of music will find many good moments here. Finally, let me note here that in the re-release of High Vaultage Records, the disc is released with an additional 7 compositions that made up the hitherto unreleased “Iron Works” EP.

Nikolaos Parastatides

7/10