There are two ways of looking at this album. One, god the vocals are bad, or two, man that guitarist can shred. I personally prefer the latter. As for the vocals, they aren't really as poor as some make them out to be, in fact 'Minoru Niihara' has quite a harmonious voice, the problem is his pronunciation of the lyrics. It is said that he only had a basic knowledge of English when this was recorded, unfortunately the almost comical delivery does distract from some cutting metal. The overall sound is a mixture between 'Dokken' and the 'Vinnie Vincent Invasion', as for the guitaring though, wow, this is just top drawer.

All the tracks flow in similar fashion, that is fast, well executed and with superb shredding. My pick of the album is the blazing '1000 Eyes' and features a positive head swaying groove, nice steady drumming and blistering work from 'Akira Takasaki'. 'Face to Face' is a hard fast rocker which opens with a guitar intro very much in the style of later 'Impellitteri'. Other favourites include 'Dark Desire' with its great opening rhythm and crunching guitars, the 'Yngwie J Malmsteen' inspired 'Dark Star Oblivion', 'Who Knows' with its 'Savatage' style opening and the 'Queensryche' sounding, well penned 'Ashes in the Sky'. 'Streetlife' is a solid number, with a great rhythmic plod but is ultimately let down by the vocals. The album closes with probably the weakest track, 'Complication', which sound clumsy and under-produced.

Ok maybe I've been a little generous with my rating for this album, but if you can get past the quirky vocals and pick up on the brilliant guitaring it makes for a very good album. On another note, imagine this group with an establish 'Power Metal' vocalist- hell!