After record company pressures and other tensions, Twisted Sister disbanded in 1987 with Dee wasting no time in writing material for his solo career. Beginning things with Desperado, Snider branched out into more of a blues-rock direction, and wrote an album of material for another project, WIDOWMAKER, which had a bit more allegiance to the late 80s Sister sound, but a bit heavier.
WIDOWMAKER’s debut album 1992’s ”Blood And Bullets” has a stellar line-up with Dee on all lead and backing vocals, superb Al Pitrelli (Joe Lynn Turner, Danger Danger) on lead guitar, drummer Joe Franco (Fiona, The Ladder) and many talented cats such as TNT’s Tony Harnell, Joe Lynn Turner and the Danger Danger boys providing backing vocals. This Japanese edition adds a bonus track exclusive for Japan.
The album, though not a huge commercial success was a consistently strong outing, showing off Dee’s great voice, strong songwriting skills, and a crisp production job. Still catchy as ever, this album puts apart the poppy feel of latter Twisted Sister records and kicks listeners in the pants with crunchy guitars and pounding drums, coupled with powerful hooks.
Hard hitters like ‘Evil’ and ‘Blood And Bullets (Pissin’ Against The Wind)’ offer up some great drum work by once Twisted Sister’s drummer Joe Franco, who is on form throughout the album. These tracks feature great solos and some interesting touches by Al Pitrelli, who is really on fire throughout this material.
Anthems abound throughout; Dee Snider proving he really is a force in this aspect – with ‘Snot Nose Kid’, ‘Emaheevul’ and ‘The Widowmaker’ and ‘Gone Bad’ all being excellent in this regard. The former has a powerful, layered vocal chorus, and while crunchy, thanks to excellent guitar work and production has a drive binging to mind Ratt. A memorable track with a hallmark guitar performance and top vocals.
After his blues rock outfit Desperado, Dee Snider came up with a Hell of a band with WIDOWMAKER. This debut is a very hard hitting brand of hard rock, with melodic metal tinges – sure, ”Blood And Bullets” is catchy, but it’s punchy, and full of attitude.
A record capped off by strong performances all round, especially Pitrelli, whose seasoned veteranism comes through in relentless creativity in the riffs and solos – a standout performance. Dee Snider is brilliant, demonstrating he knew a thing or two in this matter.
For many hard rock / metal fans Snider has never sounded better than on this album, and he’s aided by the burning lead licks of guitar master Al Pitrelli, add to that strong songs, and we have a pretty killer rocking CD here. Some great anthems, big vocals (lead and backing), heavy guitars and strong songwriting are the core of this great, underrated album.
Definitely worth checking out whether or not you were ever a Twisted Sister fan.
Highly Recommended
01 – Emaheevul
02 – The Widowmaker
03 – Evil
04 – The Lonely Ones
05 – Reason To Kill
06 – Snot Nose Kid
07 – Blood And Bullets (Pissin’ Against The Wind)
08 – Gone Bad
09 – Blue For You
10 – You’re A Heartbreaker
11 – Calling For You
12 – We Are The Dead
BONUS TRACK for JAPAN:
13 – Easy Action
Dee Snider – lead and backing vocals
Al Pitrelli – guitar, keyboards, backing vocals
Marc Russell – bass, backing vocals
Joey Franco – drums
with:
Tony Harnell – backing vocals
Joe Lynn Turner – backing vocals
Bruno Ravell – backing vocals
Steve West – backing vocals
Rich Tancredi – keyboards
WIDOWMAKER (Dee Snider) – Blood And Bullets [Japanese Edition +1 bonus], MP3+FLAC
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