AXEL RUDI PELL’S THE BALLADS IV IS A CANDIDATE FOR WORST ALBUM OF THE YEAR
If you’ve ever wanted to hear Dio’s “Holy Diver” transformed from one of metal’s most powerful anthems into a hair metal-style sad sack power ballad complete with Casio keyboards and a synth violin so shitty it wouldn’t have been considered fit to be the ringtone on the cell phone you owned in 1999, then you are going to fucking love, love, LOVE Axel Rudi Pell’s The Ballads IV.
On the other hand, if you actually have decent taste, you will probably think that this album, y’know, fucking blows.
In point of fact, I guess you can’t really consider this album an album, since it’s a compilation of “even more emotional and melancholic songs” by ARP. (It’s apparently been seven years since he released The Ballads III. THE WAIT IS FINALLY OVER!) Also, since calling it an album is an insult to every band that’s ever recorded an album, including Chelsea Grin. Seriously, it’s that fucked up.
Let there be no mistake: the “Holy Diver” cover, along with an equally cringe-inducing version of Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah,” should be enough to earn Axel Rudi Pell the status of Metal’s Current Answer to Kenny G. The Ballads IV isn’t even metal — it’s muzak.
And those are tracks that were newly recorded for this collection, which suggests that ARP thought that they would entice fans to re-purchase songs they already own, which suggests that ARP has fans, which suggests, once again, that there is no God.
The other new song on the comp, “Where the Wild Waters Flow” — yes, that is the actual name of an actual song — is the only fresh original here, but it is less painful than those covers, and it fits in nicely with the other ARP originals collected here. Which is to say, it’s one of the best Slaughter songs that Slaughter never wrote.
I keep trying to take this review seriously, but all I can think is this:
There are people who will buy this.
There are people who will buy this.
There are people who will buy this.
THEY MUST BE STOPPED.
(fuck you out of five horns)
-AR
