[ Typed in and submitted by Mike Gray ]

An article featuring Dark Angel from Metal Mania Vol. 3, No. 3, May 1989 By
Jeff Kitts.

                      In Concert: The Ultimate Revenge Part Two

	Along with such other monstrous events as World War Three and Chicago's
"Metalfests" in '87 and '88, the filming of The Ultimate Revenge Part Two
ranks as quite a major festival in its own right.
	The pair of buses provided by Combat Records arrived at the Trocadero in
Philadelphia (the location for the event) in the latter part of the afternoon
on Sunday, October 23, and proceeded to unload its cargo of beer-logged
writers, photographers, and record company personnel, including myself.
	Outside the club sat a large truck which was more like a television studio on
wheels with masses of thick cable slithering into the doors of the venue.  A
clowd of anxious (yet not nearly as insane as the crew in the opening segment
of the first Ultimate Revenge video) locals awaited entry into the club where
they would soon see Forbidden, Faith Or Fear, Death, Dark Angel, and Raven
explode in a thrashing fury.
	Inside, the impressive Trocadero resembled a miniature Radio City Music Hall
with its balcony, detailed structure, domed ceiling, and canopy over the
stage.  A total of six very large, very expensive cameras were scattered
throughout, including a moveable one at stage left which hovered above the
bands at various heights.
	First to hit the stage was Forbidden, the Bay Area's newest thrash Gods (look
for my piece on the band elsewhere in this issue).  And, as I hoped and
expected, the band proceeded to put on a highly impressive show, which
actually ended up being the finest of the night.  I attribute this to mainly
one factor: Forbidden was the only band of the night to combine stage presence
with great, well-played music.
	Playing songe off their stunning debut album Evil, such as "Chalice of
Blood", "Over The Edge," and "Through Eyes Of Glass," the band thrashed with
intense energy and churned out their music with flawless precision.  Even
drummer Paul Bostaph contributed greatly to their awesome performance with
some creative, hard-driving drumming and an endless supply of serious head-
shakin'.
	As their short but very sweet 30 minute set came to a close, I was thoroughly
impressed and deeply satisfied.
	After the show I had another opportunity to speak with Forbidden's bassist
Matt Comacho, who had this to say about the event.
	"This was a really big thrill for us.  We really didn't know what to expect
because our album isn't out yet (it is now -ed.), but we took advantage of the
opportunity and I was actually surprised by the reaction we got.  This was our
first show outside of the Bay Area and it was really exciting for us."
	Following a surprisingly short break, Philadelphia locals Faith Or Fear were
up next.  Overall I wasn't too impressed with their performance - for the
exact opposite reasons why I loved Forbidden.
	To put it bluntly, Faith Or Fear's Exodus-ish music lacked intensity and
spark, and they had literally no stage presence.  While the audience exploded
into a slamming frenzy (the fight between two girls was pretty entertaining)
upon their appearance, the band played with little enthusiasm, especially
considering that they were being filmed.
	Regardless of the fact that I was unfamiliar with their material, I felt that
Faith Or Fear played like a band that's just not hungry.
	When I spoke to one of the members of Faith Or Fear (I can't even remember
his name, much less their songs!), he commented on their performance and the
event overall.
	"Instead of starting at point Zero, this is really going to give us a head
start.  I thought our set went over really well.  As long as we come out and
do our best and the crowd doesn't hate us, then I'm happy.  I think we hung
right in there with all the other bands."
	Taking the middle slot was the Florida masters of death metal, Death, who
were my favorite band on the bill.
	Basically I found two things wrong with their set: 1) their stage presence,
and 2) their choice of songs.
	The former problem was the main reason why Death was beaten out by Forbidden
as the highlight of the night.  This was my sixth time seeing Death live, and
each time including this one, I noticed an overall lack of charisma on stage.
I figured that being on camera would give them some incentive, but no such
luck.  Each member rarely stepped away from his designated section of the
stage, and only guitarist Rick Rozz provided a bit of thrashing action.  The
rhythm section is especially dull in a live situation.  Drummer Bill Andrews
plays only with his hands and no arm or upper body movement which causes him
to tap the kit lightly, and bassist Terry Butler stands hunched over while
thrashing quite lethargicly.
	On a more positive note, Death played perfectly.  Their music was extremely
brutal yet not the least bit noisy and vocalist Chuck Schuldiner sang with the
same power and conviction as on Death's two brilliant records, Scream Bloody
Gore and Leprosy.
	While I would've rather heard more from the first record like "Regurgitated
Guts" or "Torn To Pieces" instead of less exciting cuts off the latest album
like "Forgotten Past," and "Choke On It," and while they need some work on
stage performance, I felt that from a musical standpoint, Death was nothing
short of awesome.
	"Our set went over really well - everybody loved it.  We always have gripes
about our shows, but I think we did good and I feel pretty positive about our
show," said Chuck at the end of the night.
	It's been a while since I last saw Dark Angel, and I was anxious to see them
with new vocalist Ron Rinehart.  But unfortunately I was less than satisfied
with their performance and actually rather disappointed.
	As you all know, Dark Angel is an extreamely fast thrash band, and on vinyl
they can keep it relatively under control, and I personally think thry're a
great band.  But in a live situation, they play even faster and this makes
them sound like an utter wall of ripping noise.  Imagine "The Burning Of
Sodom" at twice the speed!
	Luckily, the band members were active enough to take my mind off the blur
coming from the amps.
	For his first time in front of an East Coast crowd and especially since this
was such an important gig, I was especially pleased with the performance of
Mr. Rinehart.  He's got a great voice and a very ballsy stage attitude (which
was clearly evident when he wrung his sweat-soaked shirt onto the face of some
blond chick), and he really knew how to interact with and work up a crowd.
	But the definite highlight of their set was towards the end when a young girl
in skimpy attire ran out from backstage and did a beautiful flip off the stage
and landed on her feet near the back of the crowd!  Her score?  A perfect 10!
	When questioned about the show, Dark Angel's drummer Gene Hoglan replied:
	"We had a few problems tonight like the sound, but I thought the energy
really came through.  It was our first show in a while so it was a little
rough, but I wauld say that we're pretty happy overall."
	The saddest part of the show was the fact that Raven headlined.  Regardless
of the fact that I've never been nor will I ever be a Raven fan, I felt that
they had no place on this bill or on this video (and I'm obviously not alone
on this considering that 3/4 of the people left after Dark Angel!).
As one would expect, they had the best sound quality of the night, but their
performance was simply pitiful.  Obviously they think that running and jumping
around like maniacs compensates for their lack of natural presence and musical
flair, but to me it just came across as an insincere act.
	Chuck from Death had similar feelings: "They're fine for what they do, but I
don't think Raven fit on this bill at all.  It's like putting tobasco sauce on
a peanut butter sandwich."
	Raven vocalist John Gallagher had this to say about the show:
	"A million things went wrong, but then again a million things went right, so
I think we'll get some interesting video footage out of it.  We may be a bit
more melodic, but as far as the energy goes I think we fit right in."
	Overall it was a most enjoyable event and I personally had a great time.  And
except for stranding my friend and I in Philadelphia after the show, I wish to
thank Combat for the invitation and their hospitality.

--------

An interview of Dark Angel from Metal Maniacs Vol 35, No 10, October 1991,
written by Borivoj Krgin.

                       Dark Angel . . . those lyrics . . .

	"Our problem in the past has always been that we'd be faster than hell, but a
lot of times, the riffs would just kind of go right over your head," says Dark
Angel drummer Gene Hoglan of the sizeable musical leap the group have taken on
their latest opus, Time Does Not Heal.  "We didn't want the same thing to
happen on this album, so when Brett and I started working out all the songs,
we decided that we were gonna try to clip back a little bit of the speed and
maybe bring out some other intensities of Dark Angel . . . the power."
	Talking to Hoglan, it's clear that the skin-pounder is very much excited
about the material that makes up the fourth full-length release form these Los
Angeles-based thrashers.  As the follow up to the severely under-produced
Leave Scars, Time . . . is a crucial step in the quintet's quest to rebuild
the momentum that was created through the 1986 release of Dark Angel's most
critically-acclaimed LP to date, Darkness Descends.
	While Gene admits that Leave . . . didn't do the band many favors in the
production department, he points out that "our fans loved it anyway.  It was
such an unpopular album with the critics, it got really bad rewiews
everywhere, but the Dark Angel fans went out and bought it regardless."
	Unlike Leave . . ., which was self-produced, Time . . . marks the first time
the band have worked with the Seattle-based Terry Date, the man at the knobs
for a number of other acclaimed metal recordings, including those by Overkill
and Metal Church.  "Terry is God," says Hoglan of Date's contributions to the
making of Time . . .  "He brought out a brand new dimension in us that a lot
of other producers couldn't; not that they were bad producers, but Terry knew
exactly what we were looking for, and we clicked with him better than we had
with anybody else.  I personally hope we use him on every album we do from now
on."
	Acknowledging that he finds the confines of thrash metal to be "a little
limiting" in the way of musical diversity, Gene nevertheless claims that "it's
never really bothered me before, and it didn't really bother me this time
either.  We just tried improving ourselves; maybe not write things a million
miles an hour."
	Although Hoglan refers to the musical change between the last two records as
a "natural progression," he does admit to having had to give it "a little
concentrated effort to just not be as fast" as on the previous albums.  "I
still think the album (Time . . .) has loads of energy, but it's not as
mindlessly fast as the way a lot of Leave . . . came out, and a lot of
Darkness . . . did."  Luckily, the initial reactions from the fans suggest
that Hoglan's sentiments are shared by most of the record-buying public.  "A
lot of people realize, 'OK, they've got the singer singing, but Christ, the
tunes are heavier than hell,' and I think that's what has maintained our die-
hard fans' interest," philosophizes Eugene.
	Undoubtedly Dark Angel's most mature work to date, Time Does Not Heal is
particularly impressive considering that it comes less than two years
following the departure of founding member, guitarist Jim Durkin, who by
Gene's admission, was very much "the guy that kept all the glue togither.".
Having left the group in the middle of a headlining US tour due to "personal
problems," Jim was promptly replaced by ex-Viking man Brett Eriksen, who
decided to join the band permanently after the completion of the tour.
	While Eugene was still responsible for the bulk of the music writing on the
new album, Brett was "pretty darn instrumental" in the way the material turned
out, says the drummer.  "He brought in a new attitude, a different approach.
Jim never cared about how fast the songs were going, and Brett, he would be my
time-keeper; when I was getting a little too out-of -pocket during all the
rehearsals and pre-production, Brett would always be there saying, 'slow
down,' and I think that was a big improvement for us."
	Adjusting to Brett's songwriting style didn't require much effort, Gene
claims.  "No, I loved it.  It was so much easier writing with Brett.  It was
just kind of a very fertile stage, having a new guy, new blood, and the
fertility is still there.  I've written seven songs for the next album already
and Brett and I haven't even started collaborating yet."
	Since the album's release in February, much has been made of the sheer length
of the songs as well as that of the record itself - all sixty-seven minutes of
it.  Was there a concious effort to make a record this long?
	"No, we never really concentrated on how long the songs were," insists the
skinbasher.  "We've always had long songs, and it's never been our intent to
write them that way.  A lot of the arrangements are, kind of, fundamental
arrangements, you know, two verses-chorus-two verses-chorus-middle bridge-
lead-last verse-chorus, except that we've always had long introductions.
	"We actually had to drop a song, 'cause we had ten songs, which would have
made it seventy-one, seventy-two minutes, and that just would have made it too
silly."
	In addition to being looked upon as one of the most extreme thrash metal (not
death metal) bands around, Dark Angel is generally credited with having some
of the most mature and involved lyrics within this or any other musical genre.
Gene, who is genuinely modest about his writing abilities, admits that putting
full sets of lyrics together "does not come easy - I wish it did.  A lot of
the songs come from short stories that I write.  The more detailed songs
usually take longer to write, like 'The Death Of Innocence" off Leave Scars -
that took about five years to write."
	A perfectionist, Hoglan often rewrites songs a number of times before he
arrives at a version that he presents to the rest of the band.  "I try not to
take the easy route in lyrics," explains Hoglan, "Like rhyming 'death' with
'breath,' or 'hell' with 'bell,' or whatever.  That's a little too simple for
me.  The songs are musically challenging, so I'd like them to be lyrically
challenging as well.  I try to come up with concepts these days that aren't
written about a lot, or at least approach a topic in a different way."
	Despite the immense amount of time and effort that goes into writing these
lyrics, Eugene insists that "it doesn't bother me if some people are perfectly
content just listening to the music and ignoring the words.  I just figure
that these lyrics are there for the people that like lyrics - if they don't
care for lyrics, fine, I fust figure they're missing out on something.  It's
like cutting the entire song by one half if you're not into lyrics.  But if
some kids just prefer to listen to the music, I would like to think that our
songs can stand on their own in musical terms."
	Generalizing, Hoglan says that most of the lyrical ideas on Time Does Not
Heal deal with "human sexual behavior, the darker aspects of modern sexuality.
I'm always fascinated by children - in fact, I have songs about children on
the next album already, I've got the concepts worked out that are really
weird."
	Professing to basing most of his ideas on "the things I see," he does admit
to being heavily inspired by the work of a certain Andrew Vachsf, "a New York-
based lawyer who specializes in child molestation cases (he is vehemently
against child molestation).  His books (about five in all) have had a major
impact on the way I view the subject," says the multi-talented skinsman.
	Whatever Dark Angel's expectations are for Time Does Not Heal, it appears
that Gene is not perticularly concerned with the thought of falling behind
other thrash groups who've seemingly surged to the top of the metal heap while
D.A.'s popularity has remained at a virtual standstill.  "I'm the type of
person that feels that, if Dark Angel is not getting enough recognition, then
it's because of Dark Angel - we've done something wrong, we've put out an
album that people didn't like, or something like that," explains Gene.  "I try
not to blame anyone else but ourselves.  If Sepultura, for example, has
surpassed us in terms of popularity, then, great, they've done something
right, they've put out an album that people liked.  All we can do is do what
we feel is right, and hope that people will like it.  And if not, then maybe
they'll like the next one.  If I thought any other way, I'd be going out of
mind with worry."