'Steel Of Swabia' is the epitome of immediacy. It's brimful of easily assimilated choruses and is liberally peppered with heart stopping hooks.
Few tracks exceed 4 minutes. An astute approach. KD's songs get in quick, make their not inconsiderable mark and get out again, leaving us wanting more. Every time.
Any similarity between
Kissin Dynamite and the
AC/DC track of the same name is purely intentional. Again, track 8 on '
Steel Of Swabia' is
'Welcome To The Jungle'. No, it's not that one, but clearly there are G'n'R aspirations just bursting out of this unfeasibly young and talented German rock band.
With no sense of exaggeration, KD's
'Only The Good Die Young' would have graced either of the
'Use Your Illusion' albums. If only something this good was to appear on
'Chinese Democracy'.
Just to whet your appetite even further, there are shades and echoes of Fair Warning, The
Scorpions and
Edguy reflecting brightly from this outstanding debut album.
Openers
'Lets Get Freaky' and
'Out In The Rain' are purebred melodic pop metal attention grabbers. Riffy, hi energy songs that climax in a crescendo of pulse quickening hooks, delivered with a swaggering teenage zest.
That said, there's more than a touch of
Edguy's tongue in cheek metal-for-the-Xbox generation to the title track,
'Steel Of Swabia' and to '
My Religion', the first single release.
Not satisfied with taking a leaf from The
Scorpions' songbook, with '
Against The World' KD lift a whole chapter. It's a richly atmospheric, chest beating ballad. A big production number that sounds like the GNP of an oil producing sheikdom got spent on it.
'Zombie' trades on its glam affiliations, while '
Heart Attack' winningly combines the power of
Led Zeppelin with singalong pop. Strange bedfellows perhaps, but they sound totally at ease with one another.
Only the contrived
'Lie For Me' and the pointless, teenage rant,
'I Hate Hip Hop' fail to reach the high watermark that is so visible on the preceding tracks.
That aside,
'Steel Of Swabia' is smart, cool and, for the most part irresistible.
Written by
Brian Sunday, August 3, 2008
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