Kev Rowland
1985 saw the band follow up their debut with the same line-up, although Phil Sandoval left during the recording and only played on a few tracks. The logo on the cover may have stayed the same, but the image being portrayed was very different to that of the knights on the debut, but musically not a great deal had changed, although one can hear the band starting to push themselves and the material was improving. The sound was also much better, due in no small part in moving from Michael James Jackson who produced the debut to Max Norman who had previously worked with Ozzy Osbourne. While still dated when compared against other bands which had come out of the scene, there is no doubt that the band were starting to make strides.
It must have been difficult for them in the LA scene as they would have stood out against many of the local scene, which were more into glam, but at least it did mean they could play with many different styles of bands. One of the standouts on this is “Conqueror” which goes along at a nice pace, there is some massively complex bass while Prichard gives us some really nice solos. Everything comes together on this number, which is not always the case on every song, with Bush showing why he has always been so highly rated as a singer. Whereas the debut did not contain many moments of promise, this has much more, and with their first album behind them and plenty of gigging taking place one can hear the confidence. For me this is an album where it is necessary to look past the artwork and instead listen to the music, and for me this is where Armored Saint start to show what they are capable of, which did not come through on the debut.