MASTERS OF DISGUISE - The Savage and the Grace review

 MASTERS OF DISGUISE - The Savage and the Grace

Limb Music

http://www.masters-of-disguise.com/

It is pretty much clear to everyone that we live in an era, musically speaking, when bands and musicians pop out and try to imitate or bring back the 80’s sound. Just look out there how many N.W.O.B.H.M. bands exist. It is not rare, though, to see also bands that try to imitate other known 80’s bands like BLAZON STONE for example who play like RUNNING WILD and MASTERS OF DISGUISE who sound like SAVAGE GRACE. I think it is a strange way to pay your tribute to these great bands, but instead of making covers, you create new songs and this is at least creative.

THE COVER: MASTERS OF DISGUISE are very influenced by SAVAGE GRACE and make that obvious on the cover of their album too. The photo shows the cop who was also portrayed on the debut album of SAVAGE GRACE (“Master Of Disguise”) once again trying to scare an innocent and yet beautiful lady. The sure thing is that this cover will wake up memories.

MUSICAL STYLE: As I mentioned above MASTERS OF DISGUISE are heavily influenced by SAVAGE GRACE and this means that they play heavy/speed metal that consists of melodies and heavy riffs. Actually they manage to sound rough and yet melodic and this is an element that characterizes this band. If I want to be just with them, then I have to say that they also have influences from bands like JUDAS PRIEST, IRON MAIDEN and since they are Germans, they also have some references to the power/speed metal scene of their country.

COMPOSITIONS: The new album of MASTERS OF DISGUISE includes 11 tracks out of which two are covers of SAVAGE GRACE’s “Sins of the Damned” and FLOTSAM AND JETSAM’s “Hammerhead”. Having listened to their previous album which was their debut release I have to say that this one is not as good as their first. They have kept the same musical style, but this time they emphasize on the speed element of their sound without having the memorable melodies that made me like their debut album. The songs in this release don’t differ so much one from the other.

CONCLUSION: Two years might have passed since their debut album, but somehow I thing that MASTERS OF DISGUISE have rushed things up a bit in order to release their new album. The compositions that are included here might not be bad or boring, on the contrary they are decent, but that’s all they are. If you want to listen to something from this band, then with certainty I would recommend to you their debut album entitled “Back with a Vengeance”.

Nick “Verkaim” Parastatidis