Bullet - Heading For The Top

*=Staff's pick	Midnight Riders (Riding Free) Turn It Up Loud Heading For The Top* Rambling Man Hard Luck Lady Speeding In The Night* One Deal With The Devil Rock Steady Leather Love Raise Hell Bang Your Head

Genre	Heavy Metal	Hell Hofer	Vocals
Tracks	11	Hampus Klang	Guitar
Runningtime	41 Min.	Erik Almström	Guitar
Label	Black Lodge	Lenny Blade	Bass
Release	28 April 2006	Gustav Hjortsjö	Drums
Country	Sweden	-	Keyboards
Similar artists	AC/DC, Accept, Judas Priest

Bullet was formed by Hampus and Hell Hofer in the end of 2001 and following a demo in 2002, the band released a mini-CD on a small Polish label in 2003. In late 2004 the guys signed with Swedish label Black Lodge and now by early 2006 the debut is about to be released. Despite the lack of releases the band already has a growing number of fans and furthermore they also have their own fan club.

The music smells very much of the eighties and Bullet serves a great deal of AC/DC in their metal. First track Midnight Riders feels like an old-school metal track where AC/DC's groove meets the mid-eighties softer parts of Judas Priest. A pretty standard track but it gets you rockin' nevertheless. Most vibes I get is that Bullet comes out as a mixture of Accept and AC/DC, but in my ears it comes out mediocre. Sure it flashes at times but not enough to be blinding.

In Speeding In The Night they add a bit of a Iron Maiden touch to the song with the guitar harmonies and combined with a raw attitude it stands as one of the better tracks on the album, along with the title track Heading For The Top. Hell Hofer on vocals sounds like he is the hell-spawn of Brian Johnson (AC/DC) and Udo Dirkschneider (U.D.O., Accept). But the thing is: with Brian Johnson and Udo, their voices feel natural although they come out strained as hell, but with Hell Hofer (cool name by the way... not) his voice does not seem to be natural. Hell is trying hard to sing with a strained voice which does not sound natural and it only gets obnoxious in the end.

Ok, I admit that I get carried away at times by the sound of Bullet, but that doesn't make it especially good at the end of the day. The band is stating with the title of the album that they are Heading For The Top but I can't see what tops that they will actually reach. It can't be any higher peaks.

See also review of: Full Pull , Bite The Bullet
See also: interview with Bullet

Production	Vocals	Compositions
6	3	5

Summary
4 chalices of 10 - Thomas

These guys have true dedication to their metal calling. It might not be anything original about it, it has all been done before in the early 80s by bands like AC/DC, Accept and Judas Priest. But why invent the wheel twice? This is the ultimate metal sound and Bullet have the songs to back it up. This is a record without fillers and underground hits like Bang Your Head and Leather Love almost got as much crowd response as Metal Heart and Balls To The Wall when Bullet opened for U.D.O. in Växjö. Bullet is pure party metal! //David (8 of 10)