Angel Down
Sebastian Bach
Released – 2007 by EMI
Track List
1. Angel Down
2. You Don’t Understand
3. Back In The Saddle
4. (Love Is) A Bitchslap
5. Stuck Inside
6. American Metalhead
7. Negative Light
8. Live & Die
9. By Your Side
10. Our Love Is A Lie
11. Take You Down With Me
12. Stabbin’ Daggers
13. You Bring Me Down
14. Falling Into You |
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I let this one sit for a while because initially I was undecided. Then I let it sit some more until one day I gave it another spin to find that ‘Angel Down’ is a very, very good effort for Sebastian Bach’s first in a long time.
‘Angel Down’ comes out metal as with the title track but I’m still not entirely into this one only because he screams his way through the first track which I think is a shame considering he can sing so well. But hey, all that is forgotten on ‘You Don’t Understand’, far and away my favourite song on ‘Angel Down’. It’s metal, it’s punky and has a whole ganash of melody. Bach sings beautifully through it and to me it just has a really cool sound.
The Aerosmith cover of ‘Back In The Saddle’ has grown on me to such an extent that it’s probably a close second favourite. I love the original and it took a little convincing but this version with Axl Rose is a great effort. Axl of course sounds as Axl does and Bach does well to match him. A great heavy version with all the groove and suave of the original. Other tracks to feature Axl are ‘(Love Is) A Bitchslap’, a stomping song that harks back to early GNR days and ‘Stuck Inside’, a heavy, light and shade type of track that is less of a bright spark in my opinion.
‘American Metalhead’ is sheer force wrapped in explosives, I love it. Bach just commands you through the entire song and the riffs from Metal Mike and Johnny Chromatic are just sure fire molten lava. On ‘Our Love Is A Lie’, Bach must have been inspired by Axl as he and the band seem to be channelling the Gunners themselves and provide a little insight into perhaps what Velvet Revolver could have sounded like with Sebo fronting them.
‘Negative Light’ provides some thrash fireworks alongside some other epic, metallic but melodic powerhouses such as ‘Live & Die’ ‘Take You Down With Me’ and ‘You Bring Me Down’. But can’t Sebastian Bach write some fantastic ballads? ‘Angel Down’ is no exception with ‘By Your Side’ and ‘Falling Into You’ sure classics to rival ‘Quicksand Jesus’ from his Skid Row days.
Sebo certainly surrounded himself with the right musicians to compliment his style. In my opinion, even though I needed to warm up to it, ‘Angel Down’ truly is a fantastic album in today’s heavy metal climate… in any metal climate for that matter. From his last album with Skid Row, ‘Subhuman Race’, this seems to be a natural progression and I only wish I had included this properly in my ‘Dirty 7 of 2007’ because it would have been very close to number one.
Visit: www.sebastianbach.com – www.myspace.com/sebastianbach
Dirty Rock review by ‘Jonni Starr’ 2008
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