Review : RAVAGE – “The End of Tomorrow”

Ravage – The End of Tomorrow
released August 18, 2009 on Metal Blade

Getting Ed Repka to do an album cover for you is not necessarily the easiest thing in the world. Somehow, Ravage have managed to get him to do the artwork for The End of Tomorrow. In my experience, most of the bands that Repka has worked with certainly play up to the quality of the art. These guys would appear to be able to do that, given their almost 15 years of experience, despite this being their sophomore effort. They cannot, though. By no means can Ravage even be compared to Death, Megadeth, Possessed, or Hyades.

Given the fact that Maiden is my favorite band, I love just about all things based on that era of metal. Ravage are loud and heavy and certainly bring the NWOBHM flavor to the table, but they pale in comparison to the legends like Priest and Saxon. The riffs rarely grab your attention and Al Ravage does not know what he wants to be. Sometimes he does an atrocious impersonation of Dave Mustaine, other times he almost has a little Glenn Danzig in his voice. He comes nowhere near being up to the same level of the two aforementioned vocalists, though.

I really could not tell you who would like this album. I am a huge fan of what they take influence from, but they just cannot do it. Maybe if they get a new vocalist and try to write more creative riffs, I will be able to get into this, but I really don’t know what the appeal here is.

FCC OK
Try 3, 6, 11, 12

01. The Halls of Madness
02. Reign Fall
03. Freedom Fighter
04. Damn Nation
05. The Shredder
06. Into the Shackles
07. In Shattered Dreams
08. The Nightmare’s Hold Part 1
09. Nightcrawler
10. The Nightmare’s Hold Part 2
11. Grapes of Wrath
12. The End of Tomorrow

Rating: