I was introduced to STEVE GRIMMETT not by his time in 80’s metal legends GRIM REAPER but by his more recent work with LIONSHEART in the mid-90’s. The LIONSHEART material was more WHITESNAKE-influenced hard rock of the highest order as compared to the metal sounds of GRIM REAPER. Nowadays GRIMMETT goes simply under his own name and with the release “Personal Crisis” he turns it up a notch and introduces a heavier more traditional metal sound and it works just about perfectly.

The album opens with “Karma” and it’s a great metal track with its riff-heavy guitar and driving, simple chorus.

“Wait Forever” continues with its surgical steel guitar sound. GRIMMETT still has a great set of pipes and simply has a great “metal voice”. The chorus is again simple and straightforward yet catchy and the song is hard-driving and just plain old solid.

“Freedom” opens with a moody keyboard line as supplied by Eric Ragno (CHINA BLUE) before quickly giving way to a menacing guitar riff (courtesy of Ian Nash). Nash lays down some solid riffs throughout the album but he can shred on his solos with the likes of YNGWIE MALMSTEEN!

“Lonely” comes of as sounding a little like BADLANDS meets DOKKEN if you can believe that! And other tracks like “Afterglow”, which has a thrash metal meets SAVATAGE vibe going on and “Wrath of the Ripper” (which has a classic GRIM REAPER feel to it!) keep the pace and quality of the album up.

The album closes with “Fallen” pretty much the way it began… hard driving and catchy metal.

STEVE GRIMMETT’s “Personal Crisis” is a solid metal offering with some great personal performances from all the players involved. If you’re a fan of straight-ahead, hard-driving melodic metal you should check this release out.