English
by Penelope Tritou & Giorgos Tsekas
Its more than obvious that we are living in an era in which every now and then we will have to deal with the loss of one (or more) of our music heroes. It was the drugs car accidents or planes crashes, AIDS, then cancer or other diseases, suicides or even murders, and soon we will have to face deaths from anility too. Thankfully we were blessed to get closer to some of them and know their personalities better, so now we have to suffer the death of a friend.
Steve Grimmett was a great guy and whoever had the chance to drink a beer or hang out with him will testify how friendly and reachable he was. Of course Grim Reaper were never huge. Still this man had his feet on the ground and knew what he had achieved away from rock star attitude and acting.
We could talk for hours and write a lot of stuff about his career on Chateaux, Grim Reaper, Onslaught and Lionsheart. All aforementioned bands have released excellent albums and cover a wide spectrum from NWOBHM to melodic hard rock through Thrash metal making his work remarkable while his voice leaving its mark and print to extreme music.
Probably his finest moment is Grim Reaper’s third album 1987’s ‘Rock You To Hell’ or 1992’s self-titled with Lionsheart, still my personal favorite is his debut with Grim Reaper. 1983’s debut under the title ‘See You In Hell’ by Ebony Records came after a battle of the bands content in which they win over a hundred other groups. Recorded in only four days, Grim Reaper made their dream come true and created a fresh album that had easily passed the test of Time.
All aces were on their sleeves so the band from Droitwich (a historic spa town 22 miles south-west of Birmingham) couldn’t lose the game…The arena-rock anthem in choruses (that despite its simplicity as they mostly repeat the title again and again they were easy to remember and stacked to your mind), the polished production that was above average in which most NWOBHM albums suffered, the excellent performance by Grimmett and the glorious riffs from Nick Bowcott. His ideas were brilliant and had a fresh air that will bring you in mind Randy Rhoads and Eddie Van Halen playing something that explains why Grim Reaper’s debut had a big success in United States.
Being almost 40 years away from its release we can say that the lyrics are probably weak. But the time distance may give the advantage of a mature approaching but lacks in term a of understanding the spirit of the era. ‘See You In Hell’ is awesome and totally perfect example of marvellous, straightforward Heavy Metal and a paradigm of top notch of its genre.
Songs like the title track or ‘Dead on Arrival’, ‘Liar’ and ‘Now or Never’ are hymns of Heavy Metal that should give you goose bumps every time you hear them in a live show, a club, in the shower or in your living room. The screams and the riffs can create an electric field in which you can’t avoid on pretend you have a microphone in your hands and sing loud and proud or air guitar if like there’s no tomorrow…
Ok, I wouldn’t call it filler but ‘The Show Must Go On’ is the weakest moment here (truth be told is a great song I’m just not into ballads, other bands would kill to have such a hymn to their catalogue…), but the rest of the songs are damn good. 33 minutes after you push play you can understand why Grim Reaper have this good name and cult status after 4 decades since their first appearance. Please remember as we mentioned above that the album recordings lasted only 4 days and cost very few money …new bands with big budgets and only concern about YouTube views or Instagram followers please learn from your leaders…
