Under Jolly Roger
| Under Jolly Roger | ||||
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| Running Wild studio album | ||||
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Publication |
1987 |
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| Label (s) | Noise Records | |||
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Format (s) |
LP, CD |
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Title (number) |
8th |
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running time |
35 min 05 s |
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| occupation |
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Dirk Steffens & Rock 'n' Rolf |
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Studio (s) |
Soundhouse Studio, Hamburg |
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Under Jolly Roger is the third music album by the German heavy metal band Running Wild and was released in 1987. Above all, it marks the band's change in image and subject matter away from the occult and towards the historical.
The album title refers to the Jolly Roger , the traditional pirate flag .
Emergence
The album was recorded and mixed in 1987 in the Soundhouse Studio in Hamburg . The producer was Dirk Steffens, assisted by singer and guitarist Rolf "Rock 'n' Rolf" Kasparek .
The album was released in 1987 on CD and LP. In 2007 a remastered CD was released.
A first tour for the album, which was accompanied by the British band Satan , took the band through Germany in spring 1987 and also to Copenhagen and to the Metalmania Festival in Katowice, Poland . After this tour, drummer Wolfgang “Hasche” Hagemann and bassist Stephan Boriss left the band; in their place came Stefan Schwarzmann and Jens Becker . With the new line-up, a second tour section took place through Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Hungary. At the two concerts in Munich on November 9th and 10th, 1987, material for the live album " Ready for Boarding " was recorded.
On the cover you can see a pirate ship with the band mascot “Adrian” as a print on the sail and also as a figurehead . The back shows a drawing of the band members who are represented as pirates with accessories ( pistols , sabers , tricorns , treasure chest etc.) and who get out of a rowing boat onto the beach of a South Sea island.
The cover also has the warning “Warning: Loud Sound Effects!” Printed on it, which refers to sound effects at the beginning of the album. The thunder of cannons that could be heard there could cause damage to the pickups of turntables . Recordings of Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture are said to have a similar effect . Although this is no longer to be feared with CDs, the imprint was retained for later re-releases.
Track list
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All songs were composed by Rolf Kasparek. Likewise, all of the lyrics come from him, with the exception of the songs “Raise Your Fist” and “Land of Ice”, whose lyrics were written by Kasparek and Michael Kupper, and “Merciless Game”, which was only written by Kupper.
Meanings of some songs
- "Under Jolly Roger" and "Diamonds of the Black Chest" are the band's first "Pirate" songs, but they are still quite general and clichéd and have no explicit historical model. “Under Jolly Roger” describes a pirate journey, “Diamonds of the Black Chest” tells of a treasure hunt.
- "War in the Gutter" deals with fights between youth gangs.
- “Raise Your Fist” is about teenage metal fans who get disapproval from all sides of their social circle for their passion.
- “Land of Ice” is about a science fiction story. Scientists invent a time machine to learn about the weapons of the future, but instead they find an ice desert in 1999 that shows all the signs of a nuclear winter . The survivors confront them as “people from the past” with their responsibility for the nuclear war.
- "Raw Ride" is about street racing .
- “Merciless Game” criticizes the fact that too little is being done to counteract famine in the Third World and that political interests outweigh humanity there.
reception
After the release, the band's changed image was seen as ridiculous. Holger Stratmann from Rock Hard wrote that "rarely [...] has a group succeeded in making themselves so ridiculous in such a short time" and problematized the fact that "the four Hamburgers [...] would take themselves so damn seriously" and "The music is only a minor matter". A corresponding point of criticism with the music was the lack of variety compared to the two previous albums , so it was found that the riffs "exactly resemble those of the other albums". Stratmann drew the conclusion that "on the whole, the record was quite a letdown." And gave the album a rating of 5/10 points.
In retrospect, however, the album has classic status. On the website Powermetal.de it was stated that the new image suited the band and that the album also had a “mega-cool cover and a pretty good production” and was therefore “a good classic heavy metal record” overall. In a similar way, a reviewer from metal.de called the album "a must-have for every metal fanatic and whoever wants to become one."
Some of the songs on the album became live classics, for example the title song was to be found on the album, which was recorded in 2002 and simply titled " Live ". The live album " Ready for Boarding " from 1988, which was recorded a little sooner, offered two more songs on the album with "Raw Ride" and "Raise Your Fist", the latter song was also played on the 2000 tour for " Victory ". On the best-of- album “20 Years in History” from 2003, “Under Jolly Roger” also features the theme song and “Raise Your Fist”.
In 1992 "Beggar's Night" was re-recorded for the B-side of the planned single for the song "Sinister Eyes". However, this single never officially came out; a subsequent first release found the new recording in 1999 as a bonus track of the new edition of "Pile of Skulls".