Picking on a hair metal band\u2014especially when, in the \u201980s, one was into harder-edge bands like Saxon or Iron Maiden\u2014was like grabbing low-hanging fruit. It was too<\/i> easy… and, as we learned as we got older, often unfairly doled out. But when you were a Christian hair metal band? It was akin to wailing on the weakest kid in a game of dodgeball.<\/p>\n
Stryper was the kind of band one could show their mother they were listening to, proving that some heavy metal was indeed wholesome and wouldn\u2019t cause the family station wagon to suddenly erupt in unholy fire. Their debut effort The Yellow And Black Attack<\/i> showed that there just might have been something to the idea of religious heavy metal. I mean, it worked for Slayer… no… wait… bad example.<\/p>\n
Unfortunately, on their follow-up effort Soldiers Under Command<\/i>, not only did they turn up the level of religious bombast, they also turned the \u201csuck\u201d dial up. What could have been a solid argument for their style of hard rock ends up being a fairly dated and often limp effort.<\/p>\n
Let\u2019s get one thing out of the way: any criticism is not aimed at the religious beliefs of guitarist\/vocalist Michael Sweet and crew. These guys wear their faith on their yellow and black sleeves\u2014and, frankly, y\u2019all should know what you\u2019re walking into when you drop the needle on this record. If they got someone to pick up a bible or go to church, more power to them. No, we\u2019re going to base any opinions\u2014positive or negative\u2014on the songwriting and musicianship.<\/p>\n
To be fair, things start off fairly well with the title track. I could be biased because this was one that got attention from the metal show on the brokered radio station where I grew up\u2014but it showcases Stryper\u2019s talents (and gets their message across) fairly well. Lead guitarist Oz Fox, bassist Tim Gaines and drummer Robert Sweet all drive the beat of this one, and drive it well. Michael Sweet uses the falsetto shrieks he became (in)famous for, but he tends to control their use on this disc.<\/p>\n
The first \u201cuh-oh\u201d moment comes in the cutesiness of \u201cMakes Me Wanna Sing\u201d\u2014a song so sickeningly sweet it could send the listener into a sugar coma. It\u2019s a sudden paradigm shift from Queensryche-like vibes on the opening track to sounding like the opening band for Winger\u2014all apologies to Kip Winger and crew.<\/p>\n
The downward slide continues with another poppy lite-metal song \u201cTogether Forever\u201d (complete with the shouted title in the beginning), leading to one of three lugubrious ballads designed to lure the girls into the \u201cdangerous\u201d heavy metal world, \u201cFirst Love.\u201d Look, I get it: Poison proved that ballads can work in this genre. But for that to happen, the songwriting has to be mildly interesting… and, folks, this ain\u2019t.<\/p>\n
Soldiers Under Command<\/i> does fight back with two more powerful efforts, \u201cThe Rock That Makes Me Roll\u201d (even though the title sucks) and \u201cReach Out\u201d\u2014and, for the span of 10 minutes, it seems like Stryper had righted the ship and was ready to prove they had all the promise they previously showed.<\/i><\/p>\n
Alas, it wouldn\u2019t last. More ballads like \u201c(Waiting For) A Love That\u2019s Real\u201d and \u201cSurrender\u201d end all hope\u2014if there had been improvements in the songwriting to make these semi-interesting, it could have helped the overall fate of this album.<\/i><\/p>\n
As for the closing track \u201cBattle Hymn Of The Republic\u201d? Uh, boys, news flash: You\u2019re not Elvis, and even he<\/i> was pushing it when he sang this in concert. Not a great way to end a heavy metal album, methinks.<\/i><\/p>\n
I\u2019m sure someone somewhere will think my dislike of Soldiers Under Command<\/i> has to do with any religious views I may have\u2014and that\u2019s simply not the case. Cripes, I was a practicing Catholic when this was first released, and I recognized this disc\u2019s flaws even then. Simply put, it\u2019s a flawed album with its moments of brilliance\u2014regardless of one\u2019s beliefs.<\/i><\/p>\n
Stryper would go on to experience even greater fame one album later, and it could be successfully argued that Soldiers Under Command<\/i> helped to lay that groundwork. But it would be a menial sin to lie and say this disc is phenomenal.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":35180,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[6937],"rating":[11204],"class_list":["post-47061","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-stryper","rating-rating-c-minus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/47061","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47061"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/47061\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35180"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47061"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=47061"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=47061"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}