There are some albums which I find difficult to grasp the nettle of how to review them. Case in point is Manilla Road’s 1980 debut Invasion. Basically if you’re a big fan you’ll have this already in one of its previous incarnations and if you like a bit of Manilla Road you should buy this as… Well it’s their debut ferfukssake. If you’re new and inspired by Fenriz and his love of them well… get Crystal Logic, Open The Gates and Spiral Castle and then see if a bit less metal will suit.
Which leaves…? Right; you lot who have either never heard of them or never heard them. Well, see above. Crystal Logic etc if you’re expecting metal. If you want rock…
You got it.
Impossible to review out of context, I’ll go to basics. Invasion was mostly overlooked at the time as the world began to stick its NWOBHM blinkers on and this didn’t quite fit, rather in the same way that Saint Vitus didn’t fit either. Birthed in Seventies rock, this is still a bright and spritely debut: Sci-Fi and fantasy lyrics mixed enthusiastically and unabashed with a melody and musicianship that drew on very early Rush with its guitar led sounds and clear vocals. It toys with the metal themes that the band would later pick up with gusto as well as the progressive and epic musicality that they are now famous for. In fact its fair to say that the distinctly US brand of epic progressive metal a la Slough Feg, Hammers Of Damnation, Twisted Tower Dire and all that can claim kinship with this little album. Hell, even Cirith Ungol might have given this a sidelong, distant glance. Fluid and beautifully picked guitar leads from Mark ‘The Shark ‘Shelton as the bass and drums back them with a complex and always interesting groundwork, these six songs are still a pretty shocking master class in doing your own thing and fuck the rest.
Things like the epic thirteen minutes of ‘The Empire’ just float by in a flutter of dexterity and melody that like a Mandelbrot pattern seem to curl in on themselves and become even more detailed as you deeper. Even songs with more, er, mundane interests like opener ‘The Dream Goes On’ or the classic and often covered ‘Street Jammer’ are packed with a virtuosity that is still grin inducing. Tight as the lock on my wallet, even the cascade of music that falls from the opening of ‘Cat And Mouse’ is done with an off the cuff ease that just should not be on a debut album and takes a seventies rocker into space somewhere. The vocals are gritty but work by having a real, honest intent as the music sparks and blossoms around them. Even space rock madness like ‘Far Side Of The Sun’ just simply burns.
This is not metal, this is Seventies heavy rock in the classic sense. Bright, superb and unafraid if its own magnificent ability. If you are into the whole seventies guitar hero thing then you need this album now add from the off the Mark Shelton show is just exploding. If you like beautiful, melodic, complex seventies rock then you need this album now. If you like Manilla Road then you should have it already.
It is simply put a classic that has truly stood the test of time over more than three decades. Not many albums can say that.
(Classic/10 Gizmo)
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