DEADLY WEAPON – Deadly Weapon

Deadly Weapon is a 4-man band out of the Central USA area, and their self-titled album marks their first release. Although collectively somewhat new to the commercial music scene, this band is comprised of veteran musicians who proclaim fatigue with the current state of the Hard Rock/Metal genre prompted them to form as a band and to delve into issuing a CD … a task often only first undertaken by bucking lads less long in the tooth. All band members appear to share the vocal duties (more discussion on that topic later), with Jade Rock and Mike Cardona handling guitar duties, Bob Jaeger on bass, and Rich Lippman pounding the skins.

Deadly Weapon’s music focuses on the simplistic aspects of Hard Rock/Classic Metal … much along the lines of KISS and AC/DC, with basic riffs and chord patterns, integrated guitar solos, and prominent drum and bass lines that give the band’s music a well-rounded and easy to listen to sound. In today’s age of symphonics, electronics, and other musical wizardry, opting for the basic and straightforward approach is not necessarily en vogue, but is truly an art form within itself. Deadly Weapon’s music sounds really easy to play … which sometimes confuses a listener into thinking that the music was also easy to write. Rest assured, that’s not at all the case … it takes as much or more effort to write a catchy, simple, easy-to-play original riff or chord pattern as it does to involve multiple non-traditional instrumental pieces into a Symphonic Metal piece. From that aspect, this album is completely successful – out of the 9 songs found on this debut album, all but the opening track “Don’t Hesitate” have that rare musical cohesiveness that virtually any guitarist could pick up and play after 6 months of guitar lessons. After all, KISS and AC/DC made a helluva living out of doing the exact same thing for many many years.

The glaring weakness in this Deadly Weapon album, however, lies within the vocals. Lyrically, the album follows a similar basic approach germane to the music – there’s absolutely nothing mind-blowing or life-altering found here, but rock ‘n’ roll was never really intended to make political, environmental, or religious statements – instead, rock ‘n’ roll was always supposed to be about “fun.” Editorials aside, the basic singing voice of whoever takes the lead at the microphone for Deadly Weapon, when singing in regular octaves, sounds like an unpolished Paul Stanley. In the tracks, “Whole Lotta Man,” “Once A Bitch Always A Bitch,” “Your Love (Daughter Of The Night),” and “I Want It All,” the vocals are generally held in check and remain in a tolerable tone, but in all of the others, the tracks lose their otherwise enjoyable credibility by a total lack of ability to hit and sustain the high notes. God love ‘em for trying, but in all reality you’re likely to find more high-end vocal talent at weekend karaoke contests at your favorite watering hole.

The obvious suggestion for Deadly Weapon is to do exactly what they did musically on their next release, but to hire a legitimate vocalist to join the band – someone who can do justice to the challenges of each track … or, opt to write songs that don’t require the band members to have the unglorious task of having to strain their vocal chords. In the end, this band has the musical elements and ideas that it takes to gain wide acceptance … they just need to realize and rectify their weakest link – the fact that the vocal talent is in no way commensurate to their musical and songwriting talent.