Vices (Deluxe Edition)

Album review

Bassist Pete Way split from UFO to form Waysted, the British metal band that released its first album, Vices, in 1983. On the cover of Vices, it appears that Nosferatu has chained up a groupie in his castle basement -- a luxury that is a vice of sorts -- and this sinister scene is a fairly fair representation of the sound of the record. This is a purely metal record, never slowing down apart from the massive thump of the cover art-inspiring "Women in Chains" -- an eerie, effects-laden stomp that sounds a bit like Ozzy attempting disco. It's the weirdest moment here and maybe the best but the rest of the record is straight-up British metal, sometimes galloping along at a relentless pace ("Love Loaded," "Sleazy"), sometimes conjuring a bit of a glam groove ("Hot Love," not the T. Rex song) but often just feeling massive and heavy. Waysted aren't particularly facile with riffs or melodies but they never quite try that hard to craft a hook, either. This is all attitude, a metal attitude that's stuck in the early '80s but it's not New Wave of British Metal, thrash, or Sunset Strip hair bands -- it's the sound of old rockers starting to get a little bit long in the tooth. [Cherry Red's 2013 reissue adds six previously unreleased "Maison Rouge Mixes" as bonus tracks.]
© Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo