Spending most of 2008 touring the world on ‘The Crimson Idol’ world tour that included Australia, it certainly came as a bit of a surprise when this new W.A.S.P album dropped back in October.  Particularly when some may of considered that last years world tour, paying homage to arguably the best W.A.S.P album and one of the best concept albums of all time ‘The Crimson Idol’ would be Blackie’s swansong.  But here we are, now reviewing a brand new album ‘Babylon’.

'Babylon' Is being promoted as being themed around biblical visions of "The Four Horseman of the Apocalypse” as evidenced by the image depicted on the album cover.  As with recent offerings from Lawless, this album certainly continues on with the more mature lyrical subject matter, with the shock rock days of songs like ‘Blind In Texas’ or ‘Animal, Fuck Like A Beast’ long long gone.

Clocking in at 9 songs and about 45 minutes, the album is a pretty easy album to digest and I have to say is far more enjoyable that I initially gave it credit for.  What do they say about not judging a book by it’s cover?  The opening two punch of ‘Crazy’ (the bastard child song of the band’s seminal ‘Wild Child’ perhaps??) and ‘Live To Die Another Day’ certainly went about dispelling my initial preconceptions about the album, featuring classic metallic W.A.S.P guitar riffs, trademark Blackie Lawless vocals and soaring anthemic chorus’s. 

With it’s galloping guitars, and driving intensity, ‘Babylon’s Burning‘ is clearly the albums highlight, almost matching some of the classic metal moments from ‘The Crimson Idol‘ album.  “Listen close to hooves you hear, are thunders coming dread”  and instantly you are planted into the midst of fire and thundering hooves of the album cover.  Maybe this connection to fire and babylon burning is as much connection as is needed for including a cover of Deep Purple’s ‘Burn’ on the album?  In it’s own right it’s a pretty smokin’ version, but with only 9 songs in total and it being one of two covers, it is does leave you feeling a little shortchanged.  Another W.A.S.P classic like ‘Babylon’s Burning’, now that would of been far more appealing!

For all of the killer metal moments from the W.A.S.P back catalogue, Blackie certainly can write a killer ballad, with ‘Forever Free’ being up there as one of my alltime W.A.S.P songs.  ‘Into The Fire’ from the new album harks into ballad direction, whilst retaining a distinct heaviness, however certainly doesn’t match the magic of something like ‘Forever Free’. 

‘Thunder Red’  and ‘Seas Of Fire’  continue the fire and burning theme, and along with‘Godless Run’ return the album to a state of heaviness, however suffer from a little bit of sameness.  By no means are the tracks terrible, they just don’t quite match the intensity of the opening three songs.  Closing the album with a cover of Chuck Berry’s ‘Promised Land’ made more famous by Elvis is certainly an interesting choice to close with.  Once again, it’s certainly not a terrible song, it’s inclusion on the album is a little bemusing.

For existing W.A.S.P fans who have stuck with Blackie up until this point, then ‘Babylon’ is certainly an album worth exploring and matches recent W.A.S.P efforts, however if you are new to the band then I suggest starting with the classics, rather than jumping on board here.