Squealer - Under The Cross

*=Staff's pick	Painful Lust* Facing The Death My Last Goodbye* Thinking Allowed! Under The Cross Rules Of Life Down And Out* Fade Away Out Of The Dark* In Zaire Low Budget Heroes*

Genre	Power/Thrash Metal	Henner	Vocals
Tracks	11	Lars Döring	Guitar
Runningtime	44 Min.	Michael Schiel	Guitar
Label	AFM Records	Michael Kaspar	Bass
Release	18 Feb. 2002	-	Drums
Country	Germany	-	Keyboards
Similar artists	Brainstorm, Angel Dust

From having titled their music as "Melodic Power/Speed", the german quartet Squealer are now calling their music "Melodic Power Thrash".
And that is indeed closer to the truth nowadays than calling it pure power metal. This album has been produced and mixed by the trio Tommy Newton(both "Keeper Of The Seven Keys), Mikko Karmila and Andy Sneap(Sabbat) - and the thought behind this is said to be that the the melodic oriented Newton and Karmila were there to be a creative force and an element of harmony, and weigh up to the old thrasher Sneap. Since the debut back in the 1990 Squealer have earlier released one Ep and four fullength albums, and are now back with their fifth. They have never been a stereotype of german metal such as we have gotten used to hear it, and are not really that alike any other bands or genres either.

Compared to earlier releases this is harder and rougher, and - like many other bands these days - they are flirting quite a bit with the thrasy side of metal. I am normally no fan of such behaviour, but I must say that this is really, really good. It kicks off with the catchy Painful Lust which along with the next song is one of the more progressive tracks we find here, but with a kickass chorus. The vocals are helping quite a bit too to get away from the typical "german" style, since miccontroller Henner sounds a bit american thrash-metallist. But during the choruses they use clean vocals, often with a 3-4 men strong choir, which makes a good counteract towards the verses and the fact that the refrains a re very catchy make a very good soundpicture here. Furthermore, tracks like Facing the Death and My Last Goodbye shows great guitarplay, good riffing and sing-along choruses of high true german metalstandard. On Thinking Allowed! they show themselves from the more thrasy and faster side with killer riffs and just as good refrains.

The title track is a not as fast one, but with a good flow and good chorus, and when we come to Down and Out we get a speedball (measuring by Squealers standards) with brilliant riffs, and a - short but effective - catchy chorus. The album contains a few "lighter" songs at the end, like Fade Away for example, that is a slow but beautiful bit with a soft churus with a female vocalline along with Henner's. It's not really "metal" in the sense that we are used to, so I don't know what to say about that really - it sounds a bit like Theatre of Tragedy in their early years. That might give you an idea. But those moments on the records are few - Out of the Dark that follows next are a double bassdrum driven, fast tune with a smashing chorus (that are like built like almost every other on the album - short, with clean choirs with Henner filling in every other line). What keeps holding Squealer in the realms of melodic metal more than anything else is these catchy bridges and choruses, which almost in every song here are of hitstandard.

I don't know if the closing track In Zaire is supposed to be a joke, or if it's a cover - cause it's...unusal. :) It starts with some junglesounds, with monkeys, bongos, african chanting and stuff, and with a touch of some native tribesong over it. But nevertheless it is a good track, with heavy riffs and great hooks. They album ends in the best possible way, with Low Budget Heroes that shows why they still have the word "power" in their band description, and makes them worty to keep it. I think this goes somewhat in the veins of Brainstorm, and to some extent Angel Dust too, but all of this groups have great individuality so I'd rather not starting to compare them in a general way. If I get the question which of these bands I preffer, or like most or would recommend, I don't think I can give a good answer. They are all good, and have their own charm and special touch, but - Squealer are competing with the others for sure.

See also review of: Confrontation Street

Production	Vocals	Compositions
8	8	8

Summary
8 chalices of 10 - Tommy