Few bands are more unflinching in their refusal to turn their calendars past 1985 than this power-metal quartet. With such iron-obsessed rippers as "Metal Asylum," "Metal Tyrant," "Pounding Metal," and "Metal Daze," these dudes get as starry-eyed and sentimental about metal's formative years as a former high school football hero recalling a game-winning touchdown drive. And like most former high school football heroes, this bunch now has day jobs (Rivera copped to working in an office during the Six Pack gig).
Still, the band remains among the most authentic trad-metal outfits this side of Germany. Founded by ex-Savatage guitarist Jack Frost, the New Jersey-based group now contains a pair of players from the Cleveland-Akron area (bassist Dennis Hayes and drummer Jeff Curenton). On the band's latest, Year of the Witch, Frost redoubles the shredding, and Rivera shrieks like King Diamond in a headlock. It's all as happily self-indulgent as a fat kid at Krispy Kreme.
