This chapter is part of a book called Tales from a Metalhead written by Metal Express Radio’s President Stig G. Nordahl. The chapters will be posted one at the time and you can find them all here.
August 15, 2022, I received the sad news that Steve Grimmett had passed away in his sleep. He was only 62 years old, which of course is way too early. I had already planned to write a chapter on
Grim Reaper, but his passing made me write this chapter earlier than planned. The fact that the milestone album Rock You To Hell celebrated its 35th anniversary in the beginning of September was another encouragement.
Only a few times have I heard a band and just known right away that this is some of the coolest stuff ever. I’ve had that experience with Pantera, Artillery, Vicious Rumors, and Cloven Hoof. During college I was working weekends in a hotel washing dishes. Late on Sunday evenings we cleaned the kitchen floors. Luckily enough at that point, in 1987, Radio 1’s Hard Rock show “The Rocker” aired, and we would turn it up to 11 while swinging the brooms. One Sunday evening a track off Grim Reaper’s new album Rock You To Hell album was played. I don’t remember which one. To be honest it could actually have been any track off the album as there are no weak tracks. I was hooked right away. THAT voice, the powerful music, catchy choruses, and brilliant solos. I had no idea this was the band’s third album. Well, I had actually never even heard about the band.
Eagerly I checked the mailbox the following days to see if I would get a promo copy. I had no idea which label had released the album so there was no one I could call to ask for one either. In the end I had to go to the local record store and ask for it. I thought the odds of finding it there were low, but sometimes you win. And I did! They actually had a couple of copies, so I asked for one. I was then presented with one of the ugliest and scariest album cover art works I had ever seen at that point. Was this really the same brilliant Heavy Metal band I’d heard on the radio? The cover showed a sort of monster version of the grim reaper overlooking the corpse of a soldier who had stabbed himself in the heart with a wooden stake, or something like that. It could just as easily have been the new Death album. If you had seen my record collection you’d know that I don’t pick albums because of the covers. This one is ugly and while I don’t really care about that, I just don’t think it fits the music on the album. It’s the latter that counts and this was a bargain.
With albums back then, usually one or two standout tracks were played on the radio, and a lot of times the rest was crap. In this case it was bullseye all the way. I believe Rock You To Hell has a fair chance of ending up on a TOP 11 list of my all time favorite albums. When I played the album the needle made a little leap in the beginning of track two, “Night of the Vampire.” The vinyl looked perfectly fine. Not a scratch. I brought it back to the store thinking they’d probably say I ruined it and that they couldn’t take it back. They had a look at the vinyl and gave me the other copy. I went home to play my new favorite album one more time and the bloody needle skipped exactly on the same spot. It must have been an error in the pressing.
I got to know this album by heart and was thirsty to find out more about the band. The funny thing is that the band’s lineup isn’t typed anywhere on the album cover. There are photos of the band on the back, but no names. Well, there is no photo of a bass player on it. I thought maybe guitarist Nick Bowcott had played the bass parts too. The writing credits were typed on the label in the middle of the vinyl. They were mostly Grimmett/Bowcott. I asked Steve Grimmett about the lack of names many years later, but he didn’t seem to understand what I was talking about. Maybe there was an inner sleeve I didn’t get? I never figured that out actually. Later, when I got a CD copy of the album, all the details were in the booklet. There WAS in fact a bass player named David “Chief” Wanklin. Why didn’t he get his photo on the back cover? I still have no idea.
Producer Max Norman got his name on it at least, but no photo, of course. It was a pleasant surprise to see that the same guy who produced the Ozzy albums and my favorite Y&T album, Black Tiger, had done this one too.
I don’t quite recall the order of events that followed, but I came across a huge silk banner with the artwork from their debut, See You In Hell. I think this was even before I got a copy of it. The artwork on it is less grim and much cooler than the album. The grim reaper on the back of the steeping horse found a nice home on my bedroom wall. In the end I found a cut out copy of the album. I don’t know if I would have become an instant fan had this been the first album I had heard from them. The production is a far cry from the quality you hear on Rock You To Hell, but there are some really strong tracks, like the title track, “Dead on Arrival,” “All Hell at Loose,” and the ballad “The Show Must Go On.”
When Metal Hammer finally released their The Hard Rock and Heavy Metal Encyclopedia, Grim Reaper was one of the first bands I looked up. I was still missing the second release, Fear No Evil. Pre-internet patience was essential to find older albums and sometimes even to find information about bands. It wasn’t until 1998 I could complete my collection with all three Grim Reaper albums. BMG released a CD series called Collectables where you could order the first two Grim Reaper albums on the same CD. I’m still missing Fear No Evil on vinyl, but I am not a hardcore collector, so I can live without a copy. I’ll buy it if I get a chance for a reasonable price, of course. Speaking of album art works, that one really sucks!
Steve Grimmett had a voice I’d rate above most Metal vocalists. In the Encyclopedia, I read that he did an album with the band Chateaux before joining Grim Reaper. I always wanted to hear that album and not too many years ago I finally found it for sale online. There’s some cool stuff on there, but I couldn’t tell you one song title off the top of my head now. Later I learned, by interviewing Steve Grimmett, that his contribution to the album was just a favor to some friends and that he more or less learned the songs and recorded them in a day or so. The album is called Chained and Desperate.
As I didn’t grow up with cable TV I missed a lot of music videos I would have loved to see. The first time I saw Grim Reaper videos (or at least parts of them) was on Beavis and Butt-Head, while visiting friends who had access to MTV. I think they made fun of all of their videos, which is cool because they are rather hilarious on their own. Beavis and Butt-Head screwed up Winger’s career, which I’ll cover in a later chapter, but I think they gave Grim Reaper a boost. Steve Grimmett said he loved being featured on the show.
MTV also recorded a full concert with Grim Reaper in 1987, where the band is blasting on all cylinders. They are covering all three albums, but the focus is of course on the new album, Rock You To Hell. Every true Metalhead should watch their Minneapolis show:
I had no idea that Grim Reaper had split until I received the new Onslaught album, In Search of Sanity, in 1989, with Steve Grimmett as the new vocalist. MTV did a big feature on the release serving interviews with the band members and live footage with Steve fronting the band. I thought it was a bit weird to see Steve headbang on stage dressed in a blue collar shirt. Not quite dressed for the occasion, I dare say. It’s a shame that Grim Reaper broke up after releasing their best and most successful album. They were peaking and maybe the next album would have been even better, if at all possible. Nick Bowcott told me in 2015 that the band was sued by their record label over a 4 year period. The label lost the case in the end, but it ruined the band. It’s such a shame! Nick even names the guys responsible for it and says the professional term to describe him is “asshole” and that he should rest in pieces. He was obviously, and very understandably, still pissed about what happened back then.
On the other hand I thought the new Onslaught album was very good. What I had heard from them earlier on was not my thing. In Search of Sanity is a good, but a bit polished Thrash Metal album where Steve Grimmett’s voice is the icing on the cake. The AC/DC cover of “Let There Be Rock” got annoyingly much attention. It is not bad at all, but the original material is so much better. Not to mention the lengthy semi ballad “Welcome To Dying.” Epic! It didn’t last long though, only one album. It turned out that the album was originally recorded with a different vocalist, but they invited Grimmett to do the vocal parts instead to please the record company. Another Chateaux situation, but hopefully better paid. In the 2015 interview Steve said that “a lot of money was thrown at it, I was thrown at it.” Both Nick Bowcott and Steve Grimmett agreed that the album is very good. Nick said he loves to do aerobics to the title track. Yeah, he is a very funny guy.
After Onslaught, Steve Grimmett disappeared under my radar for a few years. In 1998, I got a promo of the album Under Fire by the band Lionsheart with Grimmett on vocals. I think the album is pretty cool, but later I read that this was their least popular release up until then. This was actually their third release. I have met people that recommend their debut album. I need to catch up on that one day. They released one more album before I heard there was a bad split between Steve and the rest of the band. The founding members and brothers Mark Owers and Stephen Owers put together another band called The Psychics some years later. They only did one album, which was released in 2009, but that one is brilliant. I offered them a Guest DJ Show slot on Metal Express Radio which they gladly agreed to do. They even made a station jingle for us in the studio with a full band and excellent vocals. It is one of the coolest jingles we have on rotation. Later they contacted me and asked for advice regarding distribution in Norway for a second album. I must have given them bad advice since the album never saw the light of day.
In 2007, we had Steve do a Guest DJ show as well. He did a very entertaining show with loads of humor and a playlist containing huge classics from the 70s and 80s. I used parts of his intros to make a really cool station jingle later. It was a real hassle to have his files sent over. I guess he was not a big computer nerd, but we figured it out in the end.
The same year his first solo album, Personal Crisis, was released and with that finally came my first opportunity to interview him. Well, in the interview Steve said it’s actually not a solo album, but an album by The Steve Grimmett Band. It still says Steve Grimmett on the sleeve though. The album showcased Steve in top shape and it contains several really strong Melodic Metal cuts, including a new version of Grim Reaper’s classic “Wrath of the Ripper.” It’s another one of those great albums that was overseen by the masses, which is too bad really. Steve said it’s the best thing he ever did. Well, nada beats Rock You To Hell, but what else can you say when you are promoting a new album? I was enthused about getting Steve on the phone, not only to talk about the forthcoming album, but of course also Lionsheart and Grim Reaper. He turned out to be a lovely guy to talk to.
The Steve Grimmett Band didn’t seem to last long though. Already in 2008 he had a new band and a new album out, both named GrimmStine. The background for the name is obviously that Steve had joined forces with another Steve, the guitar wonder Steve Stine. I never got to know the reason for the switch as Grimmett seemed really pleased with the previous band and album. I could never really get into the album, but I remember that there are some really good tracks on it. “911” and “To Catch A Killer” are still being frequently played on Metal Express Radio. That was it again. The third one-off album in a row for Grimmett.
A few years later Grim Reaper surfaced again. Well, Steve Grimmett’s Grim Reaper that is. When asking about a possible reunion with the old guys in Grim Reaper, in my 2007 interview, Steve said he preferred to “let sleeping dogs lie,” but I am glad he changed his mind. The core of the band had always been Grimmett and Bowcott. The latter, now living in the US, occupied with several different projects, couldn’t take part in the Grim Reaper resurrection on a permanent basis, hence the reason for adding Steve’s name to the band’s name. Nick would play with the band as often as he could and luckily he was there when the band played at Sweden Rock Festival in 2015; the only time I got to see the band. They did a great performance, but I’d prefer to hear more Grim Reaper songs than several tributes to Pantera, Gary Moore, and Dio, which of course was a nice gesture. For some time it seemed like “all” bands did a song to honor the late and great Ronnie James Dio. This was an obvious opportunity to have a chat with the two main guys from Grim Reaper. We had a great time hanging out. Nick turned out to be a guy with a lot of humor, which he showed several times during the interview. I finally got the story straight about why Grim Reaper disbanded in the first place, the guys take on the Onslaught album with Steve and the forthcoming Grim Reaper album.
The album, entitled Walking in the Shadows, was released in 2016, followed by At the Gates in 2019. Both were released as Steve Grimmett’s Grim Reaper.
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