
Tygers Of Pan Tang – The Wreck-Age / Burning In The Shade (1985-1987)
Cherry Red Records
Release Date: 24/06/22
Running Time: 02:30:07
Review by Simon Black
3/10
The Tygers of Pan Tang are an act often mentioned as one of the keystones of the original NWOBHM movement, but despite my deep love affair of a lot of that period of musical lore, they really have passed me by somewhat. That’s the main reason I plumped for this three CD box set courtesy of the good people at Cherry Red Records, as it felt like this was a major gap in my knowledge and a good chance to fill it. However, there’s a really obvious reason for this lack of visibility in my timeline and that is they really have struggled to maintain a cohesive sound and identity over the decades. All the way through their history, retaining a stable line up has been a nightmare for the boys from Whitley Bay (well, originally at least). This is always the killer for any band, which needs stability and a few years of building a core sound, shared musical language and most importantly a fan base.
Nothing illustrates how hard this has been for the Tygers than the fact that for this brief two album period when they were relaunched on Music For Nations after an acrimonious split from MCA Records with a new line-up. No-one from this line-up is still with the band in its current incarnation – with only guitarist Robb Wier still representing the original line up today, but he is conspicuous by his absence on these three disks. And this incarnation sounds nothing like the NWOBHM band that helped cut the whole scene in the first place…
This set dusts down their brief tenure on Music For Nations and is a lavishly released set, with some fantastic clean-up work on the music, and a lovely packaged 3 disks, box and booklet. It’s a very well-presented set (like all the lovely sets they have been re-issuing for fans) and in its favour it really does try and present something new for that audience, with the two studio albums cleaned up and polished for the age, and a bonus disk full of demo versions.
1985’s “The Wreck-Age” is aptly named however…
Despite resisting being pushed down too commercial a route by MCA (who only seemed to see them as a covers band), this album could not have screamed “Mid-1980’s US-Radio Pap” more loudly if they had chosen that as the title. This is the glossy, slick, over-produced and short-lived incarnation of the band and although there’s some great guitar work tucked away in there plus a very rich sound for the age. However, the cringe-worthy big hair front cover photo of the band is a stark contrast to their distinctive trademark artwork usually resplendent with stripey cats in power poses. It’s as big a dropped ball as Iron Maiden ditching Eddie on the front cover in favour of a cringeworthy group shot of the band in spandex and is a massive own goal, as apart from the name it confirms how little this incarnation has with the established band brand.
Then there’s the music…
Now John Deverill has a good voice, but I’m not sure he is in the right band, and the generic Pop / Hard Rock direction of the tunes sort of confirms this. And to be clear, that musical direction could have worked, but not with the song-writing calibre we have on display here. It’s clichéd and cheesy throughout, and time really does not do sexist pap like ‘Women In Cages’ any favours at all. The only thing saving this from disgrace is the fluid and fiery lead guitar work from Steve Lamb and by the time the insipid Power ballad ‘Forgive And Forget’ finishes, I really wish I could.
I am starting to regret my choices at this point, but a quick dip into Spotify cheers me up, as the top five tracks there tell me that this is a band that could crank good tunes. It’s just unfortunate that none of them appear on “The Wreck-Age”…
…It doesn’t get any better with “Burning In the Shade”.
The insipid popiness if anything goes up a couple of notches and any pretence at Metal and heaviness is thrown completely out of the window, having left with second guitarist Neil Shepherd (with the band recording this as a three piece). There’s still a few moments of fluidity in the guitar solos, but the rest of the time the guitars are just pumping out major power chords accompanied by unforgivable twinkling keyboards that really have no place on a NWOBHM album. What makes it worse again is the only other saving grace from the previous release, John Deverill, seems to have forgotten that he’s fronting a Rock band completely by this point. Vocally his performance is Pop-barely-Rock pure and simple, and it’s really highlighting how poor the song-writing that goes with this is. This genuinely is a hard listen and it’s at this point I realise that the reason why my pace of writing has dropped from about half a dozen records a week to nothing in the last few weeks, because I really have struggled to find anything nice to say about this disk and have been rather been putting off tackling it.
Finally in the set is a bonus disk containing demo tracks of seventeen of the songs on here. I was hoping that this would be a bit rougher around the edges, and dare I say it Rock, if not Metal. With regard to relaunching their NWOBHM credibility, this demo disk doesn’t even do the courtesy of sounding a little more rough and ready in its proto form, as unfortunately all these demos have been done with a drum machine, a keyboard and the fuzziest of fuzz box guitar sounds. This period killed the Tygers for a while, and when they did reform much later on this period is completely ignored. Judging from the song-writing credits across these two disks John Deverill and hired song-writer Steve Thompson need to take the blame for all this.
Sadly this is the Tygers in name only, and at this point I am really hoping that Cherry Red get the chance to reissue the original three albums, as that’s a legacy worth sharing, especially given the love that’s gone into making this collector’s box set, which to be fair, the completist fan is going to love, despite the challenges the material presents.
TRACKLISTING:
Disc 1: “The Wreck-Age” (1985)
01. Waiting
02. Protection
03. Innocent Eyes
04. Desert Of No Love
05. The Wreck-Age
06. Women In Cages
07. Victim
08. Ready To Run
09. All Change Faces
10. Forgive And Forget
Disc 2: “Burning In the Shade” (1987)
01. The First (The Only One)
02. Hit It
03. Dream Ticket
04. Sweet Lies
05. Maria
06. Hideaway
07. Open To Seduction
08. The Circle Of The Dance
09. Are You There
10. The Memory Fades
Disc 3: “Demos”
01. Forgive And Forget
02. Not Guilty
03. Undercurrent
04. The Wreck-Age
05. You’re On Your Own
06. Time To Regret
07. Slow Recovery
08. The Face Of Innocence
09. Shadow Of The Past
10. Waiting
11. Are You There?
12. The Circle Of The Dance
13. Don’t Think I Could Leave
14. Hideaway
15. Hit It
16. Never Say Never
17. The Memory Fades
LINE-UP:
John Deverill – Vocals (lead & backing)
Steve Lamb – Guitars, Vocals (backing)
Neil Shepherd – Guitars (“The Wreck Age” only)
Brian Dick – Drums
LINKS:
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