Prior to roughly a week ago, I had never heard of Vypera. I didn’t have any previous awareness or reference points such as, “Hey, the drummer was in *insert band here*!” All I knew was their debut album, Eat Your Heart Out, was slated to drop via the mostly reliable Frontiers Records and that their name sounded cool as hell. Similar to the use of an umlaut, whenever a band’s name replaces an “i” with a “y”, 9 times out of 10 that band is going to slap hard. There’s also a more than likely chance that said “y” bands are going to make the 80s aesthetic the cornerstone of their sound. It’s just a matter of how well they do it.
Vypera does exactly this and largely sticks to one speed throughout the course of their debut outing. If you dig your traditional metal on the melodic side of things, with an emphasis on blistering guitar solos and larger than life choruses, this is the album for you. There are no surprise excursions into the worlds of doom, prog, or any other traditional adjacent subgenre for that matter. Nothing that remotely implies, “Hey, we dig Mercyful Fate/Angel Witch/Black Sabbath too!” No, this sounds like early Dokken meets Defenders of the Faith era Judas Priest: ridiculously retro and unapologetically fun.
The energy on cuts like “Slow Me Down”, “Sierra”, and “Straight for the Kill” (talk about unintentional alliteration) are enough to get any old school metalhead out of their seat and rocking as if the 80s had never ended. There’s also no shortage of slick twin guitar harmonies and face melting solos, which shockingly come courtesy of sole axeman Christoffer Thelin. Kudos to this dude for nailing both Tipton AND Downing, DeMartini AND Crosby, and so forth. His chops especially stand out on the Scorpions inspired “Spellbound” and sleaze tinged “Fool for the Night”.
There aren’t many other influences on this release aside from full blown traditional metal. When there is, they’re simply undertones at best. The arrangements on “Standing on the Edge” and “Wingborne” give a slight AOR feel, but only in the same way that albums from mid 80s acts like Icon, Lion, and King Kobra did as well. The melody merely serves as a guiding point for the metal. The warm, lush “Fantasy” establishes itself as the obligatory power ballad, while the Motörhead gone glam attack of “Rock n’ Roll” is this album’s biggest surprise.
The only way this album could’ve been stronger is had it been abbreviated to 40 minutes as opposed to 50. Perhaps it’s years of listening to these types of albums, but I’m not used to such an effort surpassing the time limitations of a 33 RPM vinyl. That aside, Eat Your Heart Out is a very enjoyable and respectable attempt at recapturing the mid 80s sound and spirit nearly 40 years on. Something tells me we’ll be feeling the strike of the Vypera for years to come.
7 out of 10
Label: Frontiers Records
Genre: Heavy Metal
For fans of: Judas Priest, Dokken, Scorpions