HYAENA – Metamorphosis review

HYAENA – Metamorphosis

Qua Rock Records

https://www.facebook.com/Hyaena-forever-156325511060584/

Here I have something that will bring joy to the fans and collectors of the 80’s metal sound. There is no doubt my friends that the 80’s was an era that heavy metal was forged and all the genres that we know now were developed or started back then. And although most of us when we speak about 80’s metal have in mind countries like Great Britain, Germany and the U.S.A. (after all that’s where the huge names of the genre popped out), if you do a good research then you will find out that other countries had a very good metal scene as well. Such a country is Italy which in the 80’s had a very strong and healthy scene (although we learned more about this scene in the late 90’s). Such a child of that era are HYAENA and I am here to present to you the re-release of their 1987 demo entitled “Metamorphosis”.

Behind HYAENA was an artist whom I have learned about recently but I appreciate a lot. Gabriel Bellini was one of the guitar players of the band who is a very talented man and if you have checked out the presentation of his other works here, then you know that he can move on a great spectrum of heavy metal and rock. In the era that the demo of HYAENA was released thrash and speed metal were dominating and I think that this has affected the sound of the band. Actually the music of HYAENA is a mixture of heavy metal melodies blended with riffs that draw influence from the speed/thrash metal sound. One other thing that is very interesting with this band is the structure of their songs which at times flirt with progressive and technical thrash metal. If I didn’t know that HYAENA were from Italy, then I would bet that they are a U.S. metal band since I find many similarities with such bands like HELSTAR, SAVATAGE and SANCTUARY. 

It is really strange to me how HYAENA never managed to make an impact even to the underground metal scene, but I think that this release gives them a chance and I think that the fans of 80’s metal should not miss it.   

Nick “Verkaim” Parastatidis