W.A.S.P. – The Best of the Best
Snapper Music Recordings - 2007
By Adam McAuley
Having never been well exposed to a full-length discography of this much-lauded classic band, I felt a best-of compilation would give me a good grasp of a lot of their material. This turns out to be one of the better ones I’ve heard, with a nice mix of different styles of material, particularly on the second disc which features a number of serene ballads to balance things out. Their style is one that mixes a traditional vibe similar to
Judas Priest circa
Defenders of the Faith with a distinctive glam one that is much like what
Motley Crue does so well.
Vocalist Blackie Lawless does a reasonably efficient job at carrying out these anthemic tunes, but unfortunately doesn’t quite have the same impact as Halford does, for example, though this is a small flaw. The collection has many standout cuts from
'Sleeping (In the Fire)' with its catchy chorus to the wonderful ballad
'Titanic Overture,' which manages to be enjoyable and grow on you simultaneously. One can sense the longitivity of bands like
Priest via the diversity of this collection alone, and this band puts together quite a compelling collection. However, they also make their presence known in immediacy via the undeniably old-school style the disc portrays.
W.A.S.P. can be thus seen as one of my most sadly overlooked band of the classic period, but one that is undeniably worth checking out because of the amount of solid material that can be found on their splendid compilation here. I’m somewhat anxious to check out their full recordings now after hearing these songs, because of the variety of quality material.
Official W.A.S.P. Website
Official Snapper Music Website
