Artist: HAIL!
Venue: B.B. King Blues Club (New York, NY)
Opener: Age Of Evil
Date: 1/262009
Label: Independent Artist
When it comes to cover bands you either love them or hate them and that makes perfect sense because for every good one there are about twenty five that are bad. In some cases the cover band chooses to focus on a particular band or theme and only do material related to the artist and hence become a tribute act. The good versus bad in the tribute act realm is exponentially higher and I have to say that for every good tribute that I have been able to see that I can count ten times that many that make a mockery of the material that they are supposed to be paying homage to. Despite this the Metal Tribute bands have certainly come a long way and over the years we have enjoyed those that present us with full sets of material featuring Rush, KISS, Van Halen, Judas Priest, Slayer and Black Sabbath – the list goes on and one and would take too long to outline in this narrative so we’ll leave it at that. The act of Metal tribute makes one wonder what would happen if legends in their own right banded together and formed a tribute act of their own and with that in mind, ladies and gentlemen I give you “HAIL!”. The powerful name just makes you want to push your fist up into the air or raise the horns for the glory of the Metal and how could you resist when facing a lineup like Tim “Ripper” Owens (vocals), Dave Ellefson (bass), Andreas Kisser (guitar) and Mike Portnoy (drums). Together the guys would honor the giants of the Metal scene and most important of all – have a blast doing it. The show this evening would be at B.B. King Blues Club and find some new blood getting us all into gear. We’ll talk about them first and then get down to covering the cover band.
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Artist: Age Of Evil
Title: “Get Dead”
Label: Independent Artist
Release Date: 11/17/2009
Genre: Heavy Metal
Rating: 4/5
Having seen just what the youth of Metal offers up by experiencing a number of events held by the Paul Green School Of Rock, I was hardly surprised at the level of quality music that was put forth by the lads in Age Of Evil. The band ranges in the age of 18 through 20 and is comprised of two sets of brothers (the Goldbergs and the Ziffs). Together they display a great level of powerful Metal acumen that is a clear sign in how the lessons taught by the masters of the past had been successfully absorbed by the youth and worked with to its benefit. The six song EP “Get Dead” is a treat for a number of reasons because we get some new material, some live stuff and a couple of covers that I think everyone will enjoy. Starting it off is a bombastic track called “Cruel Intentions” and the stellar drumming of Garrett Ziff takes no prisoners and allows the guitars to paint vast musical colors with their technical riffs. I detected some Iron Maiden and Priest influences in the lead breaks with these boys and that is never a bad thing when it comes down to it. Sometimes the vocals of Jeremy seem like he is straining himself, but at this age he is probably still coming into his own voice. I loved the snarl ala Mustaine that he offers up every now and again across the tracks and think when he finds his main voice that he will be very good at it. Two covers are delivered with a rocking Skid Row track and a Judas Priest one, and while the musical adventuring kicks up the original versions a notch or two, they do keep the main premise in place so the tune remains recognizable. Vocally, Jeremy does his own thing and does not make an attempt to sound like Bach or Halford which was probably for the best because had he failed at the mimicking, it would have been something consistently referred to about the release as opposed to the guys having fun doing music that they know appeals to the larger demographic of Metal heads.
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