After a pretty comedic debut album (unitentional of course) called Worship Me Or Die, The Great Kat returned a few years later with 1990's Beethoven On Speed, her second journey into classically inspired speed metal shred guitar. This time around, she let her guitar playing do the majority of the talking, which was a good idea as her vocals, and lyrics for that matter, are what really dragged the debut album down. Here, she spews forth plenty of lightning quick classical metal explorations on tunes like the title track, the insane "Flight of the Bumblebee", the doomy "Funeral March", the clever "God!", and the crushing "Beethoven Mosh". She also whips out her violin for the impressive "Sex Violins", and really shows her classical chops on "Paganini's 24th Caprice" and " Guitar Concerto in Blood Minor" while still managing to throw in plenty of crunchy speed metal & thrash riffs. However, it's on the few pieces where she does decide to add some vocals that once again brings this CD down. Tracks like "Kat-Abuse", "Made in Japan", "Worshipping Bodies", and the obvious Megadeth rip-off "Ultra-Dead" just suffer from Kat's uncessary and bad vocalizations, and it's on these tracks that she desperately tries to overplay and force her guitar lines to deliver as quickly as her snarling vocals, failing each and every time and coming across as frantic noise in the end. It's a real shame, as The Great Kat probably would have had more success if she relied on her formidable guitar skills and less on being a raging metal vixen who could slay you with her guitar as well as her singing.
Bottom line is on this Metal Mind remaster-at just about 30 minutes long, there's not much content-wise, but a good 3/4 of this one features some sick guitar soloing, which may or may not be enough to warrant checking into it if you never heard a lick from The Great Kat the first time around.
Track Listing
1. Beethoven on Speed
2. Ultra-Dead
3. Flight of the Bumblebee
4. Revenge Mongrel
5. Funeral March
6. Kat-Abuse
7. God!
8. Made in Japan
9. Sex & Violins
10. Beethoven Mosh (5th Symphony in C Minor)
11. Gripping Obsession
12. Paganini's 24th Caprice
13. Worshipping Bodies
14. Guitar Concerto in Blood Minor: 1st Movement: Allegro in Murder
15. Guitar Concerto in Blood Minor: 2nd Movement: Adagio in Death
16. Guitar Concerto in Blood Minor: 3rd Movement: Prestissimo in Dismembe
17. Total Tyrant
18. Bach to the Future: For Geniuses Only!
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