Light The Fire

Cover	Alternate Cover 1	Alternate Cover 2

Artist: Infernal Death
Released by: Evil Angel Records
Release Date: 2007-12-24
Review: Awesome (16)

Infernal Death's first full album was a mish mash of metal sounds, a clear indication of a band lacking focus and direction. The tracks were anywhere from the catchy “Didya Want Some?” and its infectious speed metal four chord grooves to the harsh and blast beat ridden “Death By Danny” and its black metal roots. While lacking focus, it certainly showed the breadth of knowledge of the sounds of heavy metal that the two predominate song writers brought to the band.

Both Danny and Dean share five writing credits a piece on this record.

The entire album was recorded at Gunsmoke! Productions in Toronto. Dana Isaak was the primary producer on the record although Robbie Donnelly and Danny Harris had a hand in production for some of the tracks as well.

Light The Fire's cover was the first cover that Danny did not have a hand in producing. There were two alternative covers produced by Danny that were released in limited quantities, but the consensus from executives at the record company and other friends of the band was that they needed something more explosive or catching for their first full album. The cover was contracted out to a third party design office. Danny told them what kind of idea they were after, gave them the title and let them go to town. The rare alternative covers have become collectors items and are highly valued. Unopened copies have apparently sold for several thousand dollars at auction.

Didya Want Some?

Danny's “Didya Want Some?” was certainly his best work on the record and garnered the best reviews for a track by him from the critics and was later released as a single. Initially, expectations for the song were small considering it was a speedy groove with four chords and a very simple chorus.

“Didya Want Some? is a track that came about during our early years of touring the small halls and venues for tiny crowds of teenagers who were basically our age. During a multi band show I was at, while sitting in the crowd watching another act play their set list, the young crowd kept yelling at the band in between their songs to play some punk,” Danny recalls. “The band of course was a metal act, and playing punk just wasn't going to happen, but that didn't stop the kids out there from yelling it over and over again.”

After the show, the band had retreated to write some songs when Danny conceived the idea of this track, written to answer the kids in the crowd that night. “No more than three chords, maybe four,” Danny says he told himself. And from that, “Didya Want Some?” was born. Its catchy progression, quick tempo and easily remembered chorus made it a favourite for the crowds to sing along with the band to and became one of the hits off the first record.

Shock Rifle

The big hit from the record was Dean's Shock Rifle, also released in single form after Light The Fire was released. The members of the band were long time online first person shooter players and had a long standing affection for Unreal Tournament in particular. Dean wrote this as an ode to one of the game's most famous weapons, the shock rifle. Dean began the song with a solid drum fill using his low end toms for the thumping noise of the shock rifle's secondary blast being hit by its primary firing mode, which caused a large explosion of plasma and energy often resulting in many deaths.

“Oddly enough, I always figured he would have written about the minigun,” Danny comments, “as he was usually whoring up the maps with the mini more than anything else.”

Tortuga! Attack

The song, “Tortuga, Attack!”, was typical of Infernal Death's early material as a straight forward, keeping it simple, metal track. It featured some solid drum filling and a fast guitar solo and break which usually got the crowd's blood pumping during their live shows. The fans would often howl the chorus of “Tortuga, Attack!” along with Danny. This track was just before Neil Solomon joined the band and Neil only sung the song live a handful of times before it was retired from the set list.

The track is also typical of the subject matter that the band returns to, that being historical stories. Tortuga was an island in the Carribean that was colonized by English and French settlers. This song tells the tale of a Spanish attack on the island during the early 1600's.

As one of the first songs which Dean wrote that had some measure of quality, it was chosen for the first single that the band would release.

Slap My Pup

Slap My Pup was another oddity that came from Danny’s head. Funk all the way, using a distorted wah-wah pedal to give it its distinct melody and calling card, the song was likely popular more for its suggestive lyrical content than anything else.

It was earlier released as a “B” side on the Scapegoat single.

Seared Flesh

Seared Flesh is a floorfilling, fast, power metal track, written by Dean Royle. Lyrically, not as impressive as “Tortuga, Attack!”, its blazing melody was enjoyed by fans as a real energy piece during the early shows. It was partially Dean's interpretation of the band's name.

“I had this great melody rolling in my head for days on this song and couldn't think of lyrics. I looked for the first thing that could provide me some inspiration at the time and happened to see our logo on my desk and the words just sort of poured out,” Dean once commented.

It was released as the “B” side to the Tortuga! Attack single.

Scapegoat

Infernal Death’s first foray into politically inspired music was Danny’s Scapegoat.

“I thought the critics were especially harsh on that track for the day. I don’t know if it was because political music by a metal band couldn’t be taken seriously or if there was some other kind of bias, but I’m certain if that track was written today by any established metal act, the reviews would be more favourable,” Danny says. “I’m proud of the message in that song and I think the lyrics are quite good. They are not the usual rubbish that you find in our stuff where we get a little fantastical and take ourselves about a seriously as we should.”

Scapegoat is a generic metal track with a fast paced trash metal beat. The chorus rift is catchy and the lyrical content talks about government and societal interference in things which they find to blame for their own mistakes in handling issues that happen in our world. Books were always a target for those in control of the moral compass. From there, rock and roll, comics, movies and video games took their place as sacrificial scapegoats when something bad happens.

“I’m into all those things. I love reading, I play guitar and sing in a rock and roll band, I’m an avid collector of comics and a big gamer. By all accounts, I should be about the worst citizen on the planet, killing and raping and murdering,” Danny says.

Scapegoat was released as a second single with Slap My Pup as a B-side.

Never Saw It Coming

Another straight forward track with four chord progression Danny’s Never Saw It Coming was his second song with funk inspired rifts. Many have suggested a connection between this track and the other funk tune, Slap My Pup, as the lyrics perhaps can perhaps be connected as the same story line. Detractors of the theory however point out that two different cars are mentioned.

Never Saw It Coming found its way on to the Shock Rifle single as the B side.

Fredericton Death March

Dean’s lyrical song ideas were not nearly as strong as his music was with some of his early tracks. Fredericton Death March is one of these examples. Musically, the song was always capable of getting the crowd on the floor rolling and jumping to the beat with its traditional metal trappings, but lyrically speaking, not as captivating. Along with Death By Danny, Dean wrote both tracks as a tongue in cheek review of Danny’s insistence on a hard and full touring schedule during the early years.

The song was the B side on the Didya Want Some single.

Death By Danny

The second song in Dean’s satirical review of Danny’s tour management skills, Death By Danny was another example of Dean’s solid music talents while working with limited inspiration for subject matter. Still, this is one of the rare tracks that Dean’s publishing company granted the permission to reprint the lyrics. While written for a vocal line with the expected black metal shrieks and Danny’s overlayed tremolo picking rift action, the crowd still found it enjoyable to chant along with Neil during the chorus of “Death by Danny! Death by Danny!”.

Death by Danny is one of the few tracks off the first record that was not released as a single.

The Chosen

The Chosen is a track that could easily have been found on Infernal Death’s later album release, Something Wicked This Way Comes. The tracks subject matter is one of Danny’s fantasy tinged writings, dealing with a pack of werewolves. This floorfilling fantasy romp is charged by the thrashy riffing meant to symbolize the pack on the hunt as they chase their latest prey in an attempt to enlarge their group.

“All those kinds of things make for great inspiration, ghosts, goblins, ghouls and monsters,” Danny said at the time of the album’s release. “No doubt there will be more songs in our future that don’t fall too far from this tree.”

This was another track on the record that was not released as a single. It was initially slated to be, but the record company felt it best to forgo the release of this track and instead released a single of some new material that the band had completed after the tour for this record. As such, The Chosen was dropped after the test pressings and packaging were complete and instead the band released their much anticipated single, The Black Hand Comes as a prelude to their next full album. Those test pressings are worth a small amount through auction sites if they can be found. The cover for the never released single can be found off the artist's page on this site in their discography section.

No chart history.