Review Summary: Satan save the Queen.
Warlock, the German heavy metal band that would go on to shake the foundations of a subgenre that didn’t even exist just yet, was formed in 1982 in Düsseldorf. The band emerged from the local underground scene, with members from the bands Snakebite and Beast coming together to counterattack the overwhelming assault of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal. The original lineup included Doro Pesch on vocals, Peter Szigeti and Rudy Graf on guitars, Frank Rittel on bass, and Michael Eurich on drums. Doro's powerful image and stage presence combined with the band's tight musicianship would get them signed to legendary label Vertigo soon after a failed attempt of releasing their debut album
Burning the Witches with Mausoleum Records. They would also go on to open for the likes of W.A.S.P and Judas Priest on their respective tours and they would even gain a slot in big festivals like Monsters of Rock alongside bands like Scorpions, Ozzy Osbourne or Def Leppard, making Doro the first woman to front a metal band in the emblematic Donington festival.
Warlock released their debut album,
Burning the Witches in 1984. This was the year when Metallica would unleash their acclaimed
Ride the Lightning and Iron Maiden would establish their dominance with
Powerslave. In comparison, Warlock’s first release does feel very amateur. The production is aggressively raw and murky, and the songwriting doesn't reach the levels of genius of the two aforementioned albums. At the same time, what Doro and co. were doing at the time was nothing short of extraordinary. The lady fronted metal scene (I refuse to call it “Female Fronted” like only cavemen would do), was still on diapers. Wendy O. Williams and her Plasmatics had paved the way in the US coming feeding off punk and rock in the latter half of the 70s, and bands like Girlschool, Hellion or Chastain were already breaking ground at the other side of the ocean in the early 80s. In Europe, we had Abba. Well, not really, bands like Earth and Fire in the Netherlands or Circus 2000 in Italy had already started hardening their progressive rock-based sound, and in Germany bands like Acid and eventually Zed Yago would finally bring on the metal.
Burning the Witches was one of the first records I got when I was around 10 years old. I remember seeing the back pic and being severely stunned by Doro's magnificence. She looked like a character right out of a Luis Royo Cimoc cover. The moment I played the record my dad had left the room, seemingly proud of his choice of Christmas gift, but when “Sign of Satan”, which opens the album, started to blast it quickly became a terrifying experience for little Dewi. On the other hand, maybe out of morbid fear, something kept luring me to play the album over and over again during that year. I even remember playing it backwards expecting a sleep paralysis demon would appear out of my sock’s cabinet. Those were the times.
Warlock's debut has many great tracks, usually building on tremendous riffs like those of "Dark Fade", "Metal Racer", “Homicide Rocker” or “Hateful Guy”. The opener “Sign of Satan” is just pure evil, while “After the Bomb” sports a very Randy Rhoads riff and it’s probably my favorite track of the album. Even the standard metal ballad “Without You”, a pretty clear callback to fellow German rock legends Scorpions, has its own charm and sits well with the rest of the album. The guitars are sharp and gritty, the drumming is chunky and heavy, and Doro’s melodies eventually find a place in your subconscious and they’re hard to shake off in songs like the title track.
Warlock's success with
Burning the Witches was one of the first signs that the metal world was slowly shifting. In an era where the heavy metal scene was a testosterone fueled machine, Warlock presented themselves with a solid record that would be a game changer, and the beginning of a short but intense career that has influenced a fair amount of modern bands set on reproducing their sound. Doro herself, after several litigations about the band’s name that eventually saw her perform with part of her original band as Warlock 1986 at the beginning of the millenia or just under her own name in recent years, is still active today, with a full album released in 2023 and constant touring, so the story of Warlock and its legend is still being written as you read this, and hopefully it will for years to come.
