Helloween (Germany) - Death Metal Demo (1984)

 WOAH!!! It's time for review #1!

So, according to the mighty Encyclopedia Metallum (what an epic name!), these Helloween dudes are a band formed in Hamburg, Germany in 1978. From 1978 until 1981, they were called Gentry, then from 1981-1982 they were Second Hell. In 1982-1983 they changed their name to Iron Fist (possibly inspired by the British metal band Motorhead's song/album of the same name), and then, in 1983, lightning struck and the band found their permanent name: HELLOWEEN! It's like Halloween, but extra spooky because it's in hell! Kickass!

On June 17th, 1984, they released the Death Metal Demo - which according to Metallum was untitled, but it's called the Death Metal demo because both of the songs on this tape appeared on a 1984 compilation released by the German label Noise Records entitled Death Metal. On that release, one of the bands Helloween was paired with was Running Wild (you'll be hearing more about Running Wild later - at the time they were more of a heavy/speed metal band but switched to power metal with their killer 1987 album Under Jolly Roger and stuck with that style until 2005. Their stuff after that is heavy metal with power elements, but I'll be reviewing every album from that epic 1987-2005 period on this site. Still, their discography rules, regardless of era!)

The other bands that appeared on the compilation, although not power metal, were totally killer! Dark Avenger was a killer speed metal band who never appeared on vinyl again, but made an underrated demo tape in 1986 which had more of a heavy metal style. Like so many obscure metal bands, these guys deserved more. For every band that makes it, there's a ton more who don't - not because they're worse than the ones who do, but because there's so much luck required in the music industry that things don't end up working out for lots of deserving bands due to the crazy amount of competition. As a listener and collector of metal, it's amazing how much great stuff there is, and a massive part of my motivation in creating this blog is to spread the word about these forgotten legends, as well as bands who are active today but don't get as much recognition as they deserve.

There was one more band who appeared on Death Metal - the mighty Hellhammer! Interestingly, none of the bands on the compilation are death metal, at least by modern standards, but Hellhammer comes the closest to being part of that genre. They were an amazing thrash / black / speed metal band who were one of the most extreme bands to come out of the early '80s, and put out some great demo tapes in 1983 before releasing the astounding Apocalyptic Raids EP in 1984. After this, Hellhammer broke up, but some of the members went on to form Celtic Frost, one of the most trailblazing and beloved underground metal bands of all time. Another cool fact is that Hellhammer were the only non-German band on DM - they hailed from Switzerland!

Before going into my review of the songs Helloween contributed to this incredible compilation, there's one more notable thing about Death Metal - the cover!!! Holy shit, is it brutal!

So badass, but some stores were like "Oh dear god, there's no way we're selling that icky sticky ketchupy mess!" So Noise Records ended up releasing another version with a censored cover:

Something I noticed: on the original version of Death Metal, all the band's names are listed in equal size, but in this censored repress, Helloween and Running Wild get the biggest text, then Hellhammer's smaller and Dark Avenger's tiny! Uh oh! This isn't right - these bands need to be avenged! Preferably not darkly, and hopefully not with a hammer from hell! Anyway, for more info on the background behind this compilation, as well as the history of power metal in general (Noise Records ended up signing a TON of power metal bands) I highly recommend the book Damn the Machine, which comprehensively covers the story of this fantastic label.

Now that we've got all that background stuff out of the way, it's HELLOWEEN TIME!!! FUCK YEAH!!! \m/

The first song on the tape is "Metal Invaders", which would later be re-recorded for the band's classic 1985 debut album, Walls of Jericho. You can find both of the songs from this demo on the amazing 2 CD deluxe edition of that record! After a quick bit of high-pitched guitar feedback, the track bursts to life with an awesome riff provided by guitarists Kai Hansen and Michael Weikath, accompanied by some awesome cymbal chokes (a common technique in metal drumming, used here to great effect) and fills from the legendary drummer Ingo Schwichtenberg, who sadly passed away in 1995 in tragic circumstances. Ingo was a major influence on the drumming style of power metal, and the legacy of what he, along with the other members of this great band, brought to the table can still be heard in the genre today. I'm a drummer myself, so expect to hear lots of drum talk in my reviews!

After the cymbal chokes, Ingo starts playing a great, energetic beat, and bassist Markus Grosskopf gets some really good bass fills in before Hansen (who did his brilliant vocals and that great guitar work at the same time, woah!) starts the first verse. These early Helloween recordings are different than the style the band would develop on their classic Keeper of the Seven Keys albums. The production here is less polished and Hansen's vocals aren't as soaring and operatic as Michael Kiske's, who joined the band as singer so Hansen could focus just on playing guitar. These songs cross over into speed metal territory, and their rawness, along with the twin guitar playing and prominent bass lines, is reminiscent of early Iron Maiden. At the same time, there's something fresh going on that sets the music apart from what came before. I'll get into more detail about that freshness in a moment!

After the first verse, we get to the pre-chorus, where Hansen's voice reaches the stratosphere and delivers an epic vocal melody for the ages. Power metal vocal melodies are born! The next revelation occurs when the song goes to the chorus, and Ingo starts doing what would become known as the classic power metal drum beat: 16th note double kicks combined with 8th notes on the ride (the 8th notes don't have to be on the ride, as long as one hand's playing that pattern) and snare on the "ands" of each beat, which gives the music a double time feel. Ingo wasn't the first to do this kind of drum beat, as it can be traced back to Deep Purple's seminal 1971 song "Fireball", and was then made faster in speed metal classics like Judas Priest's 1978 masterpiece "Exciter", Motorhead's legendary 1979 song "Overkill" and Accept's pummeling "Fast as a Shark" from 1982. What makes "Metal Invaders" different from the tracks I mentioned is that it combines this beat with a Maiden-like sense of harmony (Iron Maiden, unlike the bands I just mentioned, never used double bass drums, except for Nicko McBrain's drumming in the song "Face in the Sand" from 2003) as well as an emphasis on catchiness and sing along melodies that makes the music feel happier than what came before. This cheery feeling is a major part of what makes power metal distinct from speed metal, the genre which it evolved from.

After the first chorus, we get a great instrumental break before the song goes into another verse, pre-chorus, and chorus, which is followed by a solo section featuring some more incredible riffs and guitar work! This is followed by another great riff + cymbal choke section, and Hansen does a wonderful high-pitched metal scream combined with a fast tom fill from Ingo, which brings us back into the instrumental break-verse-pre-chorus-chorus structure. After the last chorus, we get a brief outro that brings us out of the song with a cool delay effect on Hansen's voice, and then we hear a crowd chanting what sounds like "MAIDEN! MAIDEN! MAIDEN!" I can't confirm if this is the case, but if it is, this would be the earliest example of Helloween's classic sense of humor - they sure are self-aware!

The second, and last, song on the tape is "Oernst of Life" (interestingly, the order of these songs was switched when they appeared on Death Metal.) I have no idea what an "oernst" is, but hey, it sounds cool! According to the lyric analysis website Genius, “'Oernst of Life' is an English bastardization of the German saying 'Ernst des Lebens', which would roughly translate to “Seriousness of Life.'" So there you go - the Internet kicks ass for research!

The song starts with this deep, ominous guitar feedback that sounds like Satan snoring, and I mean that in the best possible way. After a few seconds, it gets higher pitched and then BOOM! Another fantastic riff, followed by another great cymbal choke section, brings us into the first verse. This song throws some curveballs at us: after the verse, the pre-chorus is in half-time (no chorus yet!) and when it's over, we suddenly get another tempo change: a fast, brief instrumental section that leads into the second verse, which takes us back to the original tempo. The unexpected structural variation continues into the second pre-chorus, where there's a subtle change in the lyrics, and the instrumental break where the tempo gets faster is slightly longer this time around. Then, just when you're expecting a solo or bridge section to happen, we get the chorus! Then, we get the faster tempo change again, and like last time, it's slightly longer than before and has a brief line added before the song goes into the solo. This part is a  guitar tour de force filled with massive sounding melodies, especially the one that starts at 3:02. At 3:15, the melody gets higher pitched and Ingo gets that double bass beat going again. It's so glorious! This kind of gear change, until power metal came around, was much more associated with pop music than metal, but what makes the genre so incredible is the way it perfectly balances poppy, triumphant melodies that make you feel on top of the world with the energy, aggression and riffage of metal.

After the amazing solo, we get a great half-time instrumental break that segues neatly into the pre-chorus, and this time, the chorus comes directly after. It's outstanding how much subtle variation was put into this song's structure. You never know what to expect! After the last chorus, we go back to the tempo change, but once again it's a bit different: this time it lasts longer, and serves as the song's outro. Just as the song ends, we get a couple more surprises from Kai Hansen, whose vocals suddenly get harsher. This isn't common in power metal, where the vocals are always clean and usually high pitched (with the exception of when the genre crosses over with melodic death metal, but that didn't happen until Children of Bodom pioneered that mixture in the late '90s!) First, Hansen delivers an "UGH!" worthy of Tom G. Warrior, and then he follows it with a higher pitched but still harsh sounding "OH!!!" delivered in a way that reminds me of the mighty Quorthon. Finally, we get a classic chaotic metal ending, and the demo tape comes to a close.

These songs are brilliant, and a fabulous start for both Helloween and power metal in general. Next time, I'll be writing about Helloween's self-titled EP from 1985, which also destroys!