Meliah Rage - Idol Hands (2018)^{Release ID: 19523}

Meliah Rage are a noisy bunch.  In fact Idol Hands comes straight out of the traps in a riffing frenzy and maintains this trajectory over the eight tracks on offer.  Having somehow missed this band over their 30 year plus career I wondered initially how I had never picked up on any releases previously as at first glance they seemed to have some promise for my tastes.  Then two things became immediately apparent very quickly with Idol Hands that made me see more or less instantly why my foray into their discography will probably be limited to this one release.  Meliah Rage are to me like a poor persons version of Metal Church.  That combination of power, heavy and thrash metal that Metal Church managed to nail for at least a few releases is not as well moulded here within the ranks of Meliah Rage and as a result their blend of metal is too power metal orientated for my liking.

The vocals of Paul Souza are by far the most power metal laden element to the bands sound here.  For all the riffing that Jim Koury and Anthony Nichols manage to muster from the twin guitar attack (complete with some standard yet perfectly well-done lead work also) it is Souza's vocals that blunt the attack with their overly expressive gruffness that at times are quite comedic.  Although he can hold tone, he lacks range and his style soon becomes predictable.  Equally, drummer Stuart Dowie appears uninterested (or unable) in stretching his legs beyond some very rudimentary efforts - I mean where are the fills fella?  He just sits there following the same pattern, track after track.  I am not sure he has more than one stick in all honesty.

As I said, when I threw Idol Hands on at first it was instantly obvious they were noisy enough, unfortunately what they have to say is boring and predictable.  Lyrically they hold a level of naivety that belies their years together as the below excerpt for the terrible Sentenced to Life clearly shows:

Trapped inside your body

Locked inside your head

Dying to be someone else

Wishing you were dead

This is poor heavy metal, badly written and actively suppressing the two bits of talent that the band holds (the guitarists) within limiting and restraining structures that challenge nobody in terms of skill set.