Band:	The Great Kat
Album:	Wagner's War
Style:	Neoclassical heavy metal, Speed metal, Thrash metal
Release date:	2002
A review by:	Undercraft

Act I: War
01. Wagner's "The Ride Of The Valkyries" (from The Opera "Die Walkürie") For Symphony Orchestra, Band & Opera Singers
02. War
03. Terror

Act II: Revenge
04. Punishment
05. Humiliation

Act III: Victory
06. Liszt's "Hungarian Rhapsody #2" For Symphony Orchestra & Band
07. Sarasate's "Zapateado" For Violin Piano & Band

The Great Kat, I'm sure most of you don't know this lady, and most of you are thinking this must be a joke, Who is this lady on the cover? Hey! Her boob is coming out!
Well, guys, time to open your eyes and discover The Great Kat, a talented musician, a master at the violin and guitar, and how it looks, an angry lady too, don't mess with her, neither with her country (we'll get to that later).

First let me tell you about The Great Kat ok?, Katherine Thomas is a natural gifted virtuoso, she became a violin graduate from the prestigious Julliard School of Music in New York City.
She has performed as a classical violin soloist at the legendary Carnegie Recital Hall as the winner of the Artists International Competition, and she has toured as a violin soloist in Mexico, the U.K. and America.
But then, something happened, in a incredible mutation event, Katherine Thomas shape-shifted into The Great Kat, a camouflage-wearing bikini-warrior angry guitar shredder, also known as "The Guitar Shredder From Hell".

It took us a long time here in Metal Storm to recognize the innate talent of The Great Kat, since Spin Magazine declared The Great Kat as "the speediest, scariest female shredder of all times", and Guitar One magazine recognized The Great Kat as one of the Top Ten fastest guitar shredders of all time, along with Paul Gilbert, Yngwie Malmsteen, Michael Angelo, John Petrucci among others.

Basically what The Great Kat does here is mixing classical music (Beethoven, Wagner, Bach among others) with Speed Metal, the result? Insane rapid Classical shredding.
This album is based on the events of September 11, and is divided in 3 acts, War, Revenge and Victory, each of the 7 songs are very short and the whole album only lasts 11 minutes (11:09 minutes therefore 11/9 got it?) , but believe me, is more than enough, good thing comes in small doses anyway.

The album opens with Wagner's, "The Ride Of The Valkyries" in my opinion, THE war song (if you saw Apocalypse Now, you now what I'm talking about), in "War" The Great Kat steps into the Mic, and errr.. sings, well could be more defined as shrieks, and screams here and here.
"Punishment" really shows up the talent of Kat, it even includes some choirs! We have some Death Metal grunts in "Humiliation" and finally, 2 great songs as closers, Litzt's "Hungarian Rhapsody" and Sarasate's "Zapateado" , 2 great renditions of the classical songs, done in The Great Kat Style.

Definitively a great release, very innovative and creative, the musicianship is out of this world, although the production leaves much to be desired, in general, a great release, an I must say that, I love the sound of The Great Kat in the morning, sounds like? victory.