Tank - This Means War (1983)^{Release ID: 6687}

I wonder if Tank knew something that the rest of us didn't in 1983. One doesn't expect the band who was introduced to the world playing nasty metal one step away from Venom to start with ambient electronic music. Imagine picking this up in '83, expecting something raw and getting something that sounds like Tangerine Dream. It of course goes into something metal, but it still seems at odds with their most popular image.
The strange synths starting the album also come with a production that's quite clean and modern for 1983. Take out the odd intro/outro synth and this album has a sound that comes off as if you're listening to how these instruments really sounded in the studio. If I had to change something, I would make the guitar more bombastic. They're already going for that sort of sound, but they're underselling it a bit for whatever reason. It's something that would fit a poppier group better than the dirtier sound of Tank.
Otherwise this album has a lot of "feels unique to me, probably isn't, still very nice." It's like the culmination of the NWOBHM sound, the rawness of it before the sound was tempered by commercialism, and when it still had something to prove over other, more aggressive and rawer scenes. The best example of this is in Algy Ward's vocals, more influenced by regular punk rock than anything else. Here he comes off like a regular guy doing his best, injecting what emotion he can. There are many better vocalists, but only Ward can make these songs work as well as they do.
This Means War strikes me as an album that spiritually ends an era, the NWOBHM. While Tank would never strike it as big as other bands, it is an album that represents the endgoal many had, taking the spirit of a band who grew up in an era where metal was a rare and unusual thing, and bringing it to the big labels with a mainstream sound.

I had a fair amount of time for Tank’s debut album “Filth Hounds Of Hades” with its dirty Motorhead-inspired heavy metal & hard rock offering quite a bit of appeal. Unfortunately the less up-front sequel “Power Of The Hunter” tended to fall a bit flat in comparison & sounded a lot like some of the weaker & less metal Motorhead filler material which wasn’t surprising given just how little time Tank had to prepare for the recording. Actually, if you look around a bit you'll find that some old metalheads suggesting that there really isn't much of a reason to listen to early Tank when you can listen to Motorhead delivering the genuine article instead & there’s definitely some merit in that way of thinking even though I feel it's a bit harsh when referring to Tank's debut. So the big question was whether Tank would finally be able to step away from their reputation as a Motorhead tribute act to deliver a record of real artistic merit & I’m very pleased to be able to say that Tank’s third album “This Means War” manages to achieve that.

A major contributor to the band’s fresh & more ambitious approach was the recruitment of a second guitarist which left Tank sporting a brand new four-piece lineup & gave them additional tools to work with. The guitarist in question was a gentleman by the name of Mick Tucker who had cut his teeth with NWOBHM hard rockers White Spirit (who interestingly enough were the original band of future Iron Maiden guitarist Jannick Gers). It's hard to say exactly how big an impact Mick had on Tank’s sound here but the result is a much more polished & ambitious record. “This Means War” sees Tank finally achieving a suitably professional production job & the occasional use of synthesizers adds some nice points of interest. It’s a much more polished sounding album than most people would have expected & it would have been quite a shock for those fans that were primarily attracted to the dirtier punkier nature of Tank’s early releases. But surprisingly, the new cleaner Tank sounds quite natural to my ears & I find myself really enjoying the fruits of their newly found inspiration.

The song-writing is much more expansive than it was previously with substantially longer & much more drawn out arrangements. There’s a lot more melody to this material than you might previously have expected from Tank which is obviously the result of their new acquisition. Mick Tucker is a very talented musician & his guitar solos are a huge improvement on the much simpler & sloppier efforts found on Tank’s earlier material. Front man Algy Ward’s uniquely bad-assed vocal delivery is still as identifiable as ever & while the Motorhead influence is still easily discernable, it’s no longer the be all & end all. This is a much heavier & more metal Tank who are no longer merely slaves to the sound of their idols. Some of this stuff is more metal than anything Motorhead had released to that time & it’s certainly worth checking out if you’re a fan of the NWOBHM.