Back in the 80’s and early 90’s, there
were many Christian rock and metal bands that were
poor imitations of the mainstream’s real deal.
Saint (Judas Priest copycats), Seraiah (Skid Row’s
angelic twin), Ransom (fill-in-the-blank hair band
but with a female vocalist) and many others tried
to be a positive alternative to the supposed “Devil’s
music.” Eternal Ryte obviously fell into this
group of bands, too.
This sampler includes four tracks. “Tightrope
Dancer” and “Requiem” were originally
released on their Pure Metal Records debut World Requiem
in 1990. “Quiet Times” and “Forever
Free” are from the band’s early demos.
Roxx Productions is packaging the band’s debut
and some rarely heard and unreleased demos as a two
disc set. I didn’t follow this band way back
when, but if this is indicative of their output, I
certainly didn’t miss much. I doubt you’d
disagree.
The material here is supposedly going for top dollar
on eBay in its original form. I’m not sure why
anyone would pay decent money for the initial releases
represented here, and I’m weary of the direction
Bill Bafford and company seem to be headed with reissues
akin to this. Roxx Productions has done some good
things over the past few years to revive 80’s/early
90’s Christian metal, but I’m not convinced
there are 1,000 people out there that will care enough
to snatch up this limited edition of Eternal Ryte’s
new-old release.
Key Tracks: Too few songs here for any standouts,
and you can see I’m less than thrilled to begin
with.
Reviewed by Chad Olson |
