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Udo Dirkschneider may not be a household name, but this fiesty German's
sandpaper voice is indelible worldwide to fan's of old-school heavy metal.
Those fans remember him for his days of fronting the group, Accept,
an early 80s metal machine that steamrolled Europe and was on the verge
of greatness here in the United States before record company polotics sadly
laid to waste their brilliant career in 1987.
Dirkschneider and his former Accept mate, Stefan Kauffman, are still
metal soldiers for the cause as the driving force of U.D.O.
During a trans-Atlantic phone interview, Dirkschneider's thick accent
rings loud and proud as he warned local metal heads that his self-named
band- U.D.O.- was preparing to wing it's way to Chicagoland. U.D.O. performs
at J.J. Kelly's in Lansing on June 7.
"Stefan and I still are out there and still have a metal heart,"
proclaimed Dirkschneider, playing off the title of one of Accept's best-selling
albums, Metal Heart. Kaufman, who had played drums for Accept has assumed
the role of lead guitarist for U.D.O. "Stefan is a very talented musician
who can play a variety of instruments," said Dirkschneider. "He is much
happier on guitar than he ever was on drums I think."
U.D.O. is currently supporting their seventh group album, Holy,
which was released worldwide by the Nuclear Blast Records in February.
"There is not a lot of radio today that will play the kind of music we
are making. Since we do not fit too well with Britney Spears and those
sweet little boy groups," he laughed, "we have to bring our music to the
people by coming over and playing it for them."
For all intent and purpose, the music of Accept still lives as Dirkschneider
mixes up that group's best-loved songs- "Metal Heart," Balls to the Wall,"
Breaker," "Fast as a Shark" and others- with a variety of material culled
from his U.D.O. catalog. "We are doing four songs from the new album in
our current show- the title song, 'Raiders of Beyond,' 'Shout It Out' and
'Cut Me Out'," he said. "Those are all songs that metal radio has been
playing and they are some of my (personal) favorites from the new CD."
Aside from keeping the actual Accept songs alive in his live shows,
Dirkschneider has stayed loyal to the Accept sound in the years since he
left the group rather than commercialize their style to conform to American
radio.
"In 1986, Accept was very big everywhere except in the U.S.," explained
Dirkschneider. "When you are very big, you have a lot of business people
around you. We were known in America, but not big like we were in Europe,
so all the business people started to put together a plan to make Accept
big there. The business people, those stupid people, said to the band that
if we were to break the American market in a really big way, but we could
not do it with my voice. They said we had to be more commercial and make
more radio (friendly) music than we had been doing."
The band began writing songs for the next album, the one which would
target American radio audiences. "I heard the songs and said, 'Sorry guys,
this is not my kind of music anymore!," said Dirkschneider. "They said
they wanted to go more commercial and if I wouldn't do these songs, they
would have to get another singer. So we parted ways..."
The members remained friends and even co-wrote much of the material
that became Animal House, the debut album from the newly formed U.D.O.
Accept spent the next two years with an American singer named David reece
trying to complete, Eat the Heat, the "radio-targeted" album that the record
company suits predicted would be their break-through release.
That album was finally released in 1989, nearly three years after
Dirkschneider had left the group. They toured for six short weeks and when
the album failed miserably to dent the U.S. market, Accept realized their
foolish career blunder in losing Dirkschneider and disbanded.
U.D.O. continued on for four more albums until fans demanded an
Accept reunion, to which all members agreed in 1984. "U.D.O. has been doing
well and I was happy with the band," said Dirkschneider. "We had done very
well with our records and we had good audiences for our concerts, but the
fans all wanted to see the old Accept and so I agreed to give it one more
try."
Even though the U.S. tour of the reunited Accept was a sell-out
in most markets and even though it resulted in three new Accept albums-
Objection Overruled," "Death Row" and "Predator"- Dirkschneider said the
chemistry which once made Accept a pleasure to be in, was no longer there.
"It was going well in regards to the albums and the shows, but it just
didn't feel right being together," he said. "We all felt it and decided
that we should stop everything before it went bad."
Picking up the pieces of U.D.O. once again, Dirkschneider, is now
on his third release since the second coming of accept bit the dust. "I
like all off what we have done," he said, "but I think that 'Holy' is the
very best yet. It is an album of which I am proud."
Concluding their U.S. tour leg, U.D.O. will embark for Russia, where
they will be recording shows for a live concert album that will hit stores
by mid-2001.
"There are really big venues we can play in Russia," said Dirkschneider,
who explained that his band is regulated to small venues in the U.S. "In
Russia we can tape our shows in fron of 8 or 9 thousand people each night
and we can do it all for a lot less money than we ever could here."
Dirkschneider is excited to be returning to America. "I love playing
for the fans here," he said, "because they don't hold back at all. They
are right there with you singing and the energy level makes even playing
in small clubs a wonderful experience for me. I don't need to perform in
a large concert arena to be happy, I just need to see people getting into
the music we are making. It can be 100 or 100,000... what matters is that
the people there are having a good time with us."
Holy review (incorrectly titled "Accept- Holy")
As U.D.O. hits our collective ears with Holy, their seventh release,
since forming out of the metal meltdown that was Accept, it gives a renewed
belief that old-school metal still has a future.
Frontman, singer and namesake, Udo Dirkschneider still maintains
the power and sandpaper texture that made Accept songs like "Balls to the
Wall" and "Breaker" landmark anthems for the headbanging underground. If
you need proof, most any track on holy will bear out my words.
Dirkschneider's voice is not the only driving force on Holy though.
This vocal dynamo has assembled stellar support who can keep pace with
him. This 11-song slice of sonic sound is chock full of precision riffing
from twin guitars and thick pounding groove.
Credits for the stellar six-string work goes to Igor Gianola and
(former Accept drummer) Stefan Kaufman (who proves that while being a standout
skinsman, his true calling was to the guitar). Pounding out the rythm hard
and heavy is power-house drummer Lorenzo Milani who proves to be the perfect
partner to bassist Fitty Wienhold.
Holy is a rock solid set of music from the opening notes of the
title track to the slicing and dicing sounds of heartache and anger on
the closing number, "Cut Me Out."
While this is perhaps the very best overall U.D.O. album to date
(which is saying a lot, as those who own 1989's Mean machine and 1990's
Faceless World well know) there are of course exceptional songs on any
album. To these old-school ears, those stand out selections are: "Shout
It Out," "Raiders Of Beyond" and "Holy."
Also of note is the softer (?) side of U.D.O. to which we get a
glimpse on the soothing and melodic "Friends Will Be friends." While not
the U.D.O. I like best, this cut does show Dirkschneider and the lads to
be considerably more musically well-rounded than people perceive them to
be.
-Tom Lounges