WASP – Headless Children

            Certainly not bad for a quid! To begin with I was attracted by the album cover, which can be compared to The Beatles Sergeant Peppers. It shows some great illustrations of various evils and faces, such as the Ku Klux Klan and Adolf Hitler, followed by a giant skull in the background. Very interesting to look at for a while.

            The album also has one of those cool card dust covers that I always like to see. Definitely better than the thin: ‘Home taping is killing music’ sleeves (ha).

            Before buying this album I hadn’t really heard anything about WASP, or their music. Just thought I’d experiment with some new bands. Whilst I admit the songs are all painfully similar, they’re well put together and a good listen. The opening track ‘The Heretic’, is one of the best album openers you are likely to hear in metal. It builds up a marching suspense and quickly erupts into the distorted guitars that countinue throughout the album. Very imaginative, and it’s the song that you always seem to remember after listening. It also somehow matches the album art if that makes sense. Probably not, but oh, well.

            I normally like to hear a wall of sound from metal bands and this is a great example of it, especially in the track ‘Real Me’. The vocalist, Blackie Lawless does a great job of using the ‘screamy’ style, but in a way that is subtle and sounds half melodic at the same time.

            ‘Forever Free’, the ballad of the LP, also greatly matches the vocalist. Forever Free also breaks the album nicely, as it does begin to become slightly monotonous by this stage. I’d imagine the CD version would emphasize this, with no definite side one and two. Not only that, but you couldn’t admire the full album cover.

            To conclude on that, I would say the music is great, but needs variation to avoid becoming ‘Motorhead like’. I think most people would know what I mean by that.

            The record itself is in very good condition, so I have no idea why it ended up in the reduced bin alongside Mike Oldfield and Jazz Britania. The record is very thin but doesn’t have many scratches that are sometimes associated with this. The cover and dust cover are also in great condition and would go well for a pound anytime. I would pass this on to any fellow metal fan.