RAW

Absolutely awful. It's quite clear what Crack The Sky's intent is on 'Raw' from reading this message on the back cover: "No synthesizers, no digital processing, no keyboards". Curious. I was hopeful this would set up a challenge for John Palumbo and that he'd produce an entirely different yet entirely worthy Crack The Sky album. It's certainly different enough from the rest of their catalog, but whatever you call this kind of music, it's unlistenable.

We should never judge an album by the label it's on, but the fact that this is on Grudge Records is an indicator that something is very wrong. Grudge released tons of bottom- of-the-barrel albums by mostly hard rock and heavy metal bands in the '80s, and Crack The Sky's more direct approach on 'Raw' has them fitting right in with the rest of the crud. Whether you judge this on C.T.S.'s past efforts, or as an album in its own right, it's hard to make it through even the first few songs without feeling let down. The drum sound is cold, artificial, and I suspect not entirely natural (ie. it sounds like a machine). Jamie LaRitz's guitar work borders on lead-cheese wankery, not helped by his thin and tinny tone, like any '80s pop radio rock stuff you can recall. (I say this as someone who absolutely loves great metal lead guitar work.) Writing-wise, it's clear enough that Palumbo is behind this, but song after song the Crack The Sky legacy is tarnished with poor production and an approach that sounds hurried and insincere. This amalgam of new wave, heavy metal, prog, pop and prog worked on other Crack The Sky albums, but here it comes out of the meat grinder as an extremely ugly aberration that I never, ever want to hear again. (I listened to it twice. One time too many.)