The Warrior

The New Wave of British Heavy Metal, like most any popular music movement, spawned a few truly great and enduring artists, several laudable near misses, and vast legions of hapless imitators. East London's Chariot, who putted around the scene for quite some time (about three years, to be exact) before recording their first album, The Warrior, under the auspices of a local record store, slotted into one of the final two categories — depending on who you ask. That said, elementary but semi-effective tracks like "Love or Leave Me," "Take Your Hands Off Me" and "Run with the Pack" were usually let down by their disposable lyrical clichés, and the poorly executed grander ambitions of "Don't Forget" (which added more melody, a pointless concert singalong section, and slowed down to near-power ballad gait) only confirmed suspicions that Chariot were being a tad too self-conscious of what they perceived to be chart-friendly attributes. Thankfully, as the pressures of making a good and, above all, professional first impression gradually dissipated on this, their first trip inside a proper studio, they actually managed to loosen up and just let their heads bang on a few barnstorming numbers like "When the Moon Shines," "Evil Eye," and "Vigilante." But not before reigning in budding guitar hero Scott Biaggi and burying a majority of the remaining, once explosive onstage favorites on hand here, under unnecessarily civilized gloss from which only the unexpectedly elaborate "Horizons" could acquit itself convincingly. All of which makes Chariot's first album a pleasant listen for dedicated N.W.O.B.H.M. sickos, but nothing to write home about in most other respects. [When they reissued The Warrior in 2004, Majestic Rock Records missed a golden opportunity to attract those faithful metalheads, by neglecting to include non-album cut "All Alone Again" as a bonus track.]