U.D.O.
Animal House

"An English critic in the 80s defined the voice of Udo Dirkschneider, singer of the German band Accept, as the cry of an alien giving birth." With this quote, as amusing as it is accurate, the world began to understand what kind of character Udo Dirkschneider was. Perhaps for those who only heard of him by word of mouth, he was imagined as a Paul Stanley type, tall, with a lot of hair, with a certain charm. Completely wrong! Short, somewhat chubby, with everything but charm, Udo has always been, in my opinion, the opposite of the typical rock star. A longtime music listener, at the end of the 60s, he decided to form the first embryo of what would later become Accept, which, after commitments, departures, and other things, saw their self-titled debut only in 1979. In the following years, Accept's music consistently became more "hard," in the style of Judas Priest but with a granite-like riff machine guitarist like Wolf Hoffmann on the side of the Germans. Success would come in 1981 with "Breaker," which can be considered the band's true first mature work. Until 1986, the band would continue gaining more and more fame, competing only against the more famous Scorpions, but after the "Russian Roulette" tour, Udo left the band, both to focus on his solo career and because the band wanted to change their sound, experiment, and move away from the pure heavy metal of previous albums. It's strange to talk about experimentation in the late 80s because most of them were mainly done in the early 90s. But let's move on... In 1987, while Accept took David Reece, who was tasked with carrying on the band without Udo's figure (the album "Eat The Heat" would be released later), Udo released in November of the same year, the debut of U.D.O, this being the name of his solo project. "Animal House," recorded in less than a month at "Dierks Studios," produced by Marc Dodson (a record producer of bands like Anthrax, Suicidal Tendencies, Metal Church, and Ozzy Osbourne), burst onto the market like a bomb ready to explode.

The album opens with the title track, which, after over a minute of mysterious sounds, distortions, and a voice that announces we are about to dive into our deepest nightmare, the actual song breaks out without much preamble, with Udo immediately in the spotlight with his vitriolic voice, a grand chorus, and a stunning solo. A song that Udo would almost always perform live, and which would prove more effective in a live setting. With "Go Back To Hell," there is a real punch to the teeth, the fastest track on the album, where, in the chorus with Accept-style choirs, you get all the explosive power that prepares to come with the charge of the pre-chorus. "They Want War" is one of the group's most famous tracks, where a very catchy mid-tempo and choirs of kids repeating "They are nine and ten years old, and they don’t know what’s in front of them, they only want war." A track that denounces the wickedness and indifference of the powerful who send children to war, with rifles often bigger than them, and the brutality with which they will be killed, killed like flies. "Black Widow" follows the line of the title track, albeit more slowly, and in a chorus where it maximizes its characteristic voice. "In The Darkness" is a beautiful ballad, where Udo proves he can send shivers down your spine even without singing with his vitriol voice, and where an excellent bass guides us from the introduction to the point where all the instruments find space among themselves and deliver one of the best pieces of the album. "Lay Down The Law" draws some cues from Hair Metal, loose guitars without a leash, and AOR-style choruses repeated ad nauseam. In my opinion, the only weak track of "Animal House," but not to be discarded. "We Want It Loud" puts us back in line on more direct heavy metal, even though the chorus somewhat recovers from "Go Back To Hell." Notable is a fantastic solo, the best on the album. The intro of "Hot Tonight" seems taken from "Hot For Teacher" by Van Halen from a certain point of view, but the song proves to be more direct, even if it passes without much attention. "Warrior" turns out to be a track alternating highs and lows but still stands at medium-high levels. "Coming Home" and "Run For Cover" close the album, with the former having some speed cues and seeming to have come directly from the massive "Restless And Wild" by Accept back in '82. The latter has some epic features, AOR choirs, and a cadenced advance reminding us of a sort of military march. Perhaps a well-structured copy of "Stand Tight" by Accept?

It is said that "Animal House" was entirely written by Wolf Hoffmann to present the new Accept album after Reece was to leave the band, but this obviously never happened. A little due to Udo's desire to (momentarily) close the Accept chapter, and a little because Hoffmann wanted to continue, in the end, the German sprite got the upper hand. "Animal House" sounds damn good, as a heavy metal album should sound, without overly long solos, without narrated parts, without detours, without songs of interminable length... After all, when you are about to buy a U.D.O. record, what more could you expect? If you are lovers of the most traditional HM, this band is for you.