Band:	Lizzy Borden
Album:	Appointment With Death
Style:	Heavy metal
Release date:	November 05, 2007
Guest review by:	Doc G.

01. Abnormal
02. Appointment With Death
03. Live Forever
04. Bloody Tears
05. The Death Of Love
06. Tomorrow Never Comes
07. Under Your Skin
08. Perfect World (I Don't Wanna Live)
09. Something's Crawlin
10. (We Are) The Only Ones
11. The Darker Side

A new album from Lizzy Borden - that thought can be pretty scary when considering how many bands sharing the same origin and style have failed miserably in an attempt to not fade away. Well, rest assured this in no way sounds like one of those lame "comeback" albums. This is only Lizzy's second album in almost 2 decades, the last one being 2000's "Deal With The Devil", which is only a shadow compared to "Appointment With Death".

The albums intro demands the volume being cranked to 11, there's no gimmicks with this one, no silly intro tracks or unnecessary attempts at a predictable build-up, thundering bass and drums quickly followed by a face-melting solo right off the bat. The musicianship is fantastic on every spectrum, to mix things up a bit there's an entire roster of guest guitarists, including George Lynch (Dokken/Lynch Mob), Erik Rutan (Hate Eternal), Dave Meniketti (Y&T), and Corey Beaulieu (Trivium), but don't worry, the band shows they can hold their own in the handful of songs without any guest appearances. Whether or not a few of these guest guitarists were brought in to catch the eye of the younger demographic seems totally irrelevant when actually listening to these tracks. Unlike many comeback albums from those 80's Sunset Strip bands, this doesn't come across as a vain attempt to stay "hip", while at the same time its not a terrible re-hash of the 80's sound, you can definitely tell by the sound that Lizzy is an 80's artist who has stuck to his guns, while at the same time creating something fresh and exciting.

The highlight of the album definitely has to be the vocals. Many metal critics and artists think the vocals should take back-seat to the instruments, while the music is very well put together the vocal arrangements and layered vocal harmonies are amazing, even genius at times; almost as if created by someone with a little bit of classical training - which should open the minds of those who think vocals are not very important. Not only are the arrangements incredible, but Lizzy's range matches equally in skill - he will go from low, almost gothic style singing to those mind blowing screams at the drop of a hat.

The seven year hiatus since the last album seems entirely understandable now while listening to this album, a beautiful piece of heavy metal art, what more can I say?