{"id":15094,"date":"2013-09-27T00:00:05","date_gmt":"2013-09-27T00:00:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/?p=15094"},"modified":"2013-11-12T10:39:40","modified_gmt":"2013-11-12T10:39:40","slug":"album-review-aska-fire-eater","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/album-review-aska-fire-eater\/","title":{"rendered":"ASKA – Fire Eater (2013) | Album \/ EP Reviews @ Metal Forces Magazine"},"content":{"rendered":"

ASKA
Fire Eater<\/strong><\/span>
\n\"\"
\nPure Steel (2013)<\/span>
Rating: 8\/10<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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There are a few bands with the moniker Aska, but this Texan combo are probably the oldest and best of the lot. Formed back in 1990, Aska are a straight up powerful metal band of the highest order. Fire Eater is their sixth opus but only their third this side of the millennium, with Absolute Power<\/em> (2007) being their last foray into the studio.<\/p>\n

Aska are certainly a band for whom the term \u201ccult status\u201d would surely apply and Fire Eater<\/em> is an explosive record, featuring killer soaring vocals from ex-Omen vocalist George Call and a wall of sound that meanders into thrash territory with the frothing bass of Keith Knight (Warrion) and the volatile drums of Danny White (ex-Omen), and then there is that immense guitar sound courtesy of Call and Chris Menta. <\/p>\n

This really is a wholesome metal record that takes me back to the mid-80s when bands such as Armored Saint and Meliah Rage \u2013 and to some extent a weightier Judas Priest and Iron Maiden \u2013 were doing the rounds. This is especially the case with Call\u2019s impressive vocal range, which is exemplary on the fantastic and fiery \u2018Dead Again\u2019 and the cover of the Priest classic \u2018The Ripper\u2019.<\/p>\n

Fire Eater<\/em> is such a good metal album that has all the hallmarks of a great 80s styled record. In fact, it\u2019s so embedded in that era that fans of modern metal may actually find it rather lo-fi in its quality, but for me this is molten metal magic combining classic Maiden-esque twin leads, especially on \u2018Son Of A God\u2019 (which is pretty much Iron Maiden from head to toe) and the white hot rumbling of closer \u2018Eye Of The Serpent\u2019, featuring more wondrously melodic guitar work and burning hot thrash power.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s fair to say that there aren\u2019t many bands who have that 80s quality but who can adapt to the modern climate, though Aska are such a pure force of cold steel on the skull that I\u2019m literally stunned as to why these guys aren\u2019t bigger. Some detractors may argue that this is dated metal, but why change a formula that doesn\u2019t need fixing? When heavy metal is played this genuine my only advice is to let the mellow strains of \u2018Angela\u2019 wash over you and succumb to the volcanic eruptions of \u2018Red Cell\u2019 with its orchestrated lacing. <\/p>\n

Yes, George Call does sound like Bruce Dickinson, but so do so many vocalists, though when the music is this sizzling one can forgive such archetype warbling. Time to let the hair down (if you have any left) and bang your head until your heart\u2019s content.<\/p>\n

Neil Arnold<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ASKAFire Eater Pure Steel (2013)Rating: 8\/10 There are a few bands with the moniker Aska, but this Texan combo are probably the oldest and best of the lot. Formed back in 1990, Aska are a straight up powerful metal band of the highest order. Fire Eater is their sixth opus but only their third this […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24,800],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15094","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-album-ep-reviews","category-aska"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15094","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15094"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15094\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15096,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15094\/revisions\/15096"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15094"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15094"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15094"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}