The Hell Candidates-Bring to war

2007




Portland, Oregan's The Hell Candidates have been around for over a decade. The cover doesn't really give an accurate image of what the music might be on this disc. Once I started it up I was right away taken back in time about twenty plus years or so. This band sounds like the kind of classic metal influenced acts that were popular in the metal underground years ago. There is a huge Judas Priest influence mainly focused around the albums from 1980-1984. However the production is less polished and even the performance has something of a "live" feel to it . I mean that in the most postive sense. This is a band who are far from perfect, they are loose around the edges and seem to figuring some things out as they go along yet that goes well with this no-nonsense sound. They remind me some of Ohio's Damien only with female vocals and a little order to their style. On many tracks I felt like I was listening to a lost demo from 1987 or so. The only downfall was that they went on a bit too long. Once it got around track eleven I felt like they were continuing on more than they needed to. Still this is an album that I see myself going back to. They have that old style metal sprit and that goes a long ways.