US progressive technical metal band WatchTower started their journey back in 1982. They had began mainly as a cover band but soon started writing their own material. In 1983 they were approached by Rainforest Records to release an album but that never materialized because the label went under. Their line-up consisting of vocals: Jason McMaster; guitar: Billy White; bass: Doug Keyser; drums: Rick Colaluca released their first album 'Energetic Disassembly' in 1985. Around '86 one of the founding members and main songwriter, Billy White left the band and was replaced by Ron Jarzombek (S.A. Slayer, Spastik Ink.). They continued to play live despite the future not being certain. In 1987 Jason was asked to be guest vocalist for Dangerous Toys to which he said yes. Eventually they got signed to Columbia Records and he decided to go with them full time. To fill the vacant vocalist spot the band recruited a friend of theirs, Mike Soliz (Militia, Assalant) in 1988. He recorded only one song with them (featured on the Noise Records compilation 'Doomsday News 2') before being replaced by Hades wailer Alan Tecchio. 1989 saw the release of WatchTower's second album, called 'Control And Resistance'. A year later Alan left the band to join Non-Fiction, and that was pretty much the end. Or was it? The band reunited around 2000 and have since been working on some new material as well as released a compilation on Monster Records. Only time will tell if that new album, currently entitled 'Mathamatics' will see the light of day soon as the band themselves don't even know.

CONTROL AND RESISTANCE (1989) NOISE

WatchTower belongs in the category for bands I've heard about for ages, but never really checked out myself. Sort of weird, really, as I'm a huge fan of the power/prog genre, a genre this band practically invented themselves! I am also familiar with many of the other bands that members from WatchTower went on to. Well, the time to remedy this metal "blasphemy" has finally come. But low and behold, I'm about to make a new one! You see, I cannot by the life of me seem to get into this bands music, at all! Yes, they play extremely well, and the production is good. I also like the fact that they can remind me of so different bands as Annihilator and Symphony X. But that doesn't help the fact that I can't remember a single line from any of the songs when the album stops. This is technical metal for the sake of being technical, and the songwriting, in my opinion, lacks because of it. And Alan's voice is, forgive me, quite painful to listen to when he sings in his high, helium inflated, register. He sounds much better when he lowers his range. I'm also wondering if that annoying drum sound is there on purpose. Sometimes it sounds like someone is shook a bag of beans in front of the microphone, and then played the noise at a very high speed. I can't explain it any better, but it is annoying the crap out of me. Oh brother, I'm going to get lynched for this, but this is how I feel. I know this is supposed to be a classic, but I doubt I'll listen to 'Control And Resistance' that often.

Killer tracks: The Fall Of Reason, Control And Resistance

Related artists:

Hades, Seven Witches