D-A-D — Riskin' It All (review)

Album · 1991 · Hard Rock

4/5 · 2011-04-27
UMUR

"Riskin' It All" is the 4th full-length studio album by Danish heavy/ hard rock act D-A-D ( then D.A.D.). The album was released in October 1991 by Medley Records. "Riskin' It All" was meant to be D-A-D´s big breakthrough in America ( the band even changed their name from Disneyland After Dark to D.A.D. to avoid possible lawsuits from the Disney corporation. They changed it again later to D-A-D) and the album was released in the USA through Warner Brothers. That marriage didn´t end happily though as D-A-D was fired by Warner Brothers as a result of poor sales ( well that was the labels opinion anyways). Other than the failed US adventure the album sold fairly well other places in the world though ( Scandinavia, mainland Europe and Japan).

The music style on the album pretty much continue the heavy rock/ hard rock style the band started playing on the preceeding album "No Fuel Left for the Pilgrims (1989)" albeit with a bit more commercial sensibility. The album spawned three "hit" singles in "Bad Craziness", "Grow or Pay" and "Laugh 'n' A 1/2". Thorleif Hoppe´s cartoonish music video for "Bad Craziness" is legendary. There are several hard rocking tracks on the album like "Bad Craziness", the title track ( the hardest/ most "metal" track on the album), "Makin' Fun Of Money" and "Rock 'n' Rock Radar", but the album also displays other sides of the band´s sound. For example "Grow or Pay" which is a power ballad type track, "Down That Dusty 3'rd World Road" that has the country type feel that the band were known for on their early albums and "Laugh 'n' A 1/2" which is a classic acoustic guitar rock ballad. All in all a quite varied album. As always with the humourous/ comical lyrics that D-A-D excel in.

The musicianship is excellent. I like how much room the two-string bass playing by Stig Pedersen is given in the mix, the solid drumming by Peter Lundholm Jensen, the attitude laden vocals by Jesper Binzer and the brilliant lead guitar/ twang guitar work by little brother Jacob Binzer.

The album is well produced by Nikolaj Foss, D.A.D. and Lars Overgaard. Lots of hard rocking power in that sound.

"Riskin' It All" ( while not as successful in the US as expected) did very well in cementing D-A-D´s position as the hardest rocking act from Denmark, and while the band have softened a bit over the years, playing more mainstream hard rock/ rock these days, no one has been able to claim the Danish hard rock throne since. I wouldn´t call "Riskin' It All" a flawless album by any means, but it´s an important album in my collection. About half of the tracks on this album are Danish hard rock classics while the rest are very enjoyable albeit a bit more standard in quality. A 3.5 - 4 star rating is warranted.

more than 2 years ago
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UMUR wrote:

more than 2 years ago

It´s a classic Danish hard rock album. We have two copies in my house as my wife had one before we moved in together. I always loved the comical element on the album. D-A-D never took themselves too seriously and that´s sometimes deliberating IMO.