Motörhead – Bomber

I originally posted this in September 2021, and here we are again just over four years later wishing you all a very relaxed Boxing day. I hope that you all exchanged small gifts with love from family and friends (unless you're not celebrating Saturnalia, like the rest of us Pagans) for good luck and a bountiful harvest.

I guess it's time to let loose todays album of the day...if you don't already have it (what the actual fuck??) get it!

We’re creeping up upon my day of birth, when my proud parents held me aloft in a kinda Lion King way…. No, seriously…they did. First born n’ all that. This undoubtedly means I’m gonna taint you all with something of a classic from 1979. This was the year that changed my life (musically anyway) for the better.

The New Wave of British Heavy Metal in the early 1980's is commonly thought to be the point at which this loud and larger than life genre of music began to gain steam and become much faster and more aggressive, but one need look no further than the early work of Motörhead (okay, punk is important in the equation too) for a sense of where the increased focus on speed came from. In early 1979, Overkill was released and its title track is to this day considered an indispensable influence on speed metal, and in 1980 the band would release the not even remotely overrated Ace of Spades which was the recipe for sheer badassery. And yet, the more balanced and paced Bomber, seems to be the band's most overlooked early album - a shame, because it's the most essential Motörhead album for my money. However, having been released in October 1979, it was sandwiched between their two most popular albums. Despite this, it doesn't really matter to me that Overkill came first, because Bomber was still ahead of its time for 1979 and showed enough song writing progression from Lemmy and co. to be an extremely worthy follow-up album not even a full year later.

Recorded in late summer 1979 and released by the end of the year, Bomber quickly followed up Overkill, Motörhead's landmark breakthrough album so of course, Bomber bears a lot in common with its fan-favourite predecessor. For starters, it features the classic Motörhead line-up: Ian Fraser “Lemmy” Kilmister (bass and vocals), "Fast" Eddie Clarke (guitar), and Phil "Philthy Animal" Taylor (drums). Also like Overkill, Bomber features the production grace of Jimmy Miller, the man responsible for the Rolling Stones' late-'60s/early-'70s albums, including such masterpieces as Beggars Banquet, Sticky Fingers, and Exile on Main St. And the music here on Bomber explodes on song after song, thanks to the crazed performances of the aforementioned band members as well as the well-overdriven, ear-rattling production perfection of Miller. Bomber kicks ass and its best moments, namely "Dead Men Tell No Tales," "Stone Dead Forever," and "Bomber," are as superlative as any Motörhead would ever record. The band was really on fire during this point in time and could seemingly do no wrong.

Herein, though, Lies the disadvantage of releasing more than one album in such a short span of time. One or more of them is likely to be overlooked, and it just so happens that the two more canonically important albums overshadow the one that is the most varied and consistent of the bunch. Like I said above, there's a great deal of fully realized song writing chops on display on Bomber; it's got plenty of hooks which are usually just a few simple notes or power chords like in the main riffs of "Lawman" and "Sharpshooter", not to mention the main bassline of "Stone Dead Forever." I feel that it's overall a bit riffier fare than on Overkill, both on these balls-out tracks and on slower ones like "Sweet Revenge", which is much more involved than the bluesier songs Motörhead had done up to this point like "Capricorn." However, it never reaches Sabbath levels of emphatic riffiness (which defined heavy metal music in general), therefore still lending the music the looser, more rock 'n' roll feel that makes this band feel so charming and timeless.Bomber is also really well-paced, and I love that. Side A is pretty much flawless since it's got kind of a valley structure; "Dead Men Tell No Tales" is really energetic and inspires the listener with a good message about staying clean (if nothing else I always sing "but I don't care for lies!" to myself), but then the album gradually slows down before picking up again on Sharpshooter. "Poison" might be slightly less memorable than the first four songs, but there's really nothing truly bad I can say about that song, either. Side B is honestly even better, though - I especially like "All the Aces" and "Talking Head” since they're the prime examples of satisfying deep cuts for full-album listeners. Finally, you get an awesome burst of energy to close out the album with the titular "Bomber", which showed Lemmy's interest in history as much as women and having a good time. 

 

Motörhead – Overkill

Motörhead's landmark second album, Overkill, marked a major leap forward for the band, and it remains one of their all-time best, without question. In fact, some fans consider it their single best, topping even Ace of Spaces. It's a ferocious album, for sure, perfectly showcasing Motörhead's trademark style of no holds barred proto-thrash -- a kind of punk-inflected heavy metal style that is sloppy and raw yet forceful and in your face. Motörhead, the band's self-titled debut from 1977, had been rush-recorded, and its stripped-down, super-raw sound wasn't all that impressive, at least not relative to what would follow. Overkill is what followed, recorded in December 1978 and January 1979, and released not long thereafter. The band's sound is fully formed here, and it totally explodes right off the bat on the five-minute title track. A number of Motörhead standards follow, among them "Stay Clean" and "No Class." Produced by Jimmy Miller Overkill sounds wonderful, especially on the numerous remastered editions of this album. The band's classic line-up -- Lemmy (bass and vocals), "Fast" Eddie Clarke (guitar), and "Philthy Animal" Taylor (drums) -- is well in place here, and they seem eager to rip loose wildly on every single song. This, in addition to the solid track listing and Miller's production, makes Overkill a perfect Motörhead album. Several great ones would follow, of course, but Overkill was the first of the great ones, and quite possibly the greatest of all.

Motorhead - Ace Of Spades

With the 1980 release of Ace of Spades, Motörhead had their anthem of anthems (that is, the title track) the one trademark song that would summarize everything that made this early incarnation of the band so legendary, a song that would be blasted by legions of metalheads for generations on end. It's a legendary song, for sure, all two minutes and 49 bracing seconds of it. And the album of the same name is legendary as well, among Motörhead's all-time best, often considered their single best, in fact, along with Overkill. Ace of Spades was Motörhead's third great album in a row, following the 1979 releases of Overkill and Bomber, respectively. Those two albums have a lot in common with Ace of Spaces. The classic line up; Lemmy (bass and vocals), "Fast" Eddie Clarke (guitar), and "Philthy Animal" Taylor (drums); is still in place and sounding as alive and crazed as ever. The album is still rock-solid, boasting several superlative standouts. Actually, besides the especially high number of standouts on Ace of Spades (at least relative to Bomber, which wasn't quite as strong overall as Overkill had been) the only key difference between this 1980 album and its two 1979 predecessors is the producer, in this case Vic Maile. The result of his work isn't all that different from that of Jimmy Miller, the long-time Rolling Stones producer who had worked on Overkill and Bomber, but it's enough to give Ace of Spades a feeling distinct from its two very similar-sounding predecessors. This singular sound (still loud and in your face, rest assured), along with the exceptionally strong song writing and the legendary stature of the title track, makes Ace of Spades the ideal Motörhead album if one were to choose one and only one studio album. It's highly debatable whether Ace of Spades is tops over the breakthrough Overkill, as the latter is more landmark because of its earlier release, and is somewhat rougher around the edges, too. Either way, Ace of Spades rightly deserves its legacy as a classic. There's no debating that.

Motördamn - Over The Top

After the failure of the Damned’s sophomore album “Music For Pleasure”, and the departure of Brian James in 1978, Dave Vanian, the Captain, and Rat continued playing briefly as the Doomed with Lemmy jamming live on bass before the intrepid trio could reclaim the band name. With Algy Ward recruited from Aussie legends The Saints on bass, the new Damned set about recording for their sixth single, “Love Song”. Then on May 14^th 1979, (I hope you’re taking notes, I may be asking questions later) The Damned found themselves in the same studio as Motörhead. What happens when legends collide? Well, this single for one. As the back label says, ‘the seven headed beast’ put down “Over The Top” then Lemmy hung around to help crackout the Doomed’s live favourite, “Ballroom Blitz”.