TALETELLERS – Radicalizer

If you’ve wished for some ’90s Heavy Metal and Hard Rock the American way, the sophomore release of the band Taletellers, entitled Radicalizer, should suit you pretty well. Think about Skid Row (something between Slave To The Grind to the Subhuman Race period), Alice In Chains, The Cult, and late era Anthrax and Metallica all under the same wing, and this is exactly what you will get.

Generally, Radicalizer is composed of thirteen simple tracks that display diverse early ’90s Metal with blinks of Hard Rock. The material is very catchy and the templates of the tracks are pretty much similar to one another with their simplistic nature. The music is attacking, skull crushing, and angry at some points. Most of the way the tracks come through without too much melody, however, they bear a solid lead guitar section. Furthermore, the vocals, which start with a slump, turn out to be even better as the album progresses.

The album’s weakest point is the basic structures of the tunes. The album’s templates might have worked out well, yet a number of tracks show the band took a rather safe bet with their decision to play it secure with simple templates. Some of those were quite heavy with cool aggressive riffs and mighty grooves, like “Nail It Down” (but a terribly wrong pick for an opener with terrible vocals), “Go To Hell” (might be close to Thrash, yet keeps on repeating itself) and the closing “24/7 Bad Ass” (not such a bad ass). However, those were only slightly higher up the ladder in comparison to “Calling The Demon”.

With those safer bets, Taletellers provides some great tracks that remind some of the better moments near the period of time where Metal lost a great portion of its ’80s momentum. Energy chargers such as “The Keepers Of Doom”, “Rolling Into Ruin”, “The Lie”, and “Radicalizer” show the best of what this foursome crew are capable of on this release. Although repetitive within the songs, the performance and the flow of these tracks were great and quite thrilling. With the addition of a good sound production by the hands of Phil Hillen, the rating of those tracks went up even more. Moreover, you might recognize that beginning with the third track, “Mary-Anne”, vocalist Alan Costa actually started singing with a lot more passion than on the former ones. His contribution to the rest of the material was very important.

Radicalizer displays great grooves and some known, but highly enjoyable riffs. Taletellers composed some fine material while trying to keep it traditional. This one might not be their best of effort, yet it is recommended if you desire something easy and aggressive.

Tracklist

1. Deus Ex Machina
2. Nail It Down
3. Mary-Anne
4. The Lie
5. Radicalizer
6. Calling the Demon
7. Go to Hell
8. Enter the Gun
9. Sadictico
10. Rolling into Ruin
11. The Keepers of Doom
12. Slave
13. 24/7 Bad Ass

Lineup

Alan Costa – Vocals
Stefan Kuhn – Guitar
Michael Morgenthal – Bass
Sebastian Berg – Drums