Riot - The Brethren Of The Long House (1995) [Japan 1st Press]

After the highly entertaining and musically diverse post-80s album Nightbreaker was released, Mark Reale and his newly formed two guitar incarnation of Riot recorded this, the best and most underrated CD to come out during the Mike DiMeo era of the band (which just recently ended with DiMeo’s defection to better known and successful German Power Metal outfit Masterplan). “Brethren of the Long House” is significant both as a piece of entertainment and as a work of art, loaded with speed metal classics, mid tempo riff monsters, a rather interesting vocal arrangement of Shenandoah, and a lyrical retrospective about the history of the struggles between displaced European settlers and the Natives of what is now known as America.

The production of this release is pretty solid and is a slight step up from that of its predecessor. The drums in particular are thunderous and triumphant, and the double bass pedal parts are crisp and clean. The guitars have the right balance of high and low end mixed together, creating a sound not all too dissimilar from the guitar sound found on Maiden’s Powerslave. The keyboards, when applied, are done so tastefully and don’t drown out the other instruments. The vocal tracks are clearly defined and don’t flood the entire arrangement when multiple voices are layered in during the choruses.

The music on here is a more polished and speed metal version of “Nightbreaker”, drawing from the same combination of speed metal tracks and melodic mid-tempo rockers. The first full length track “Glory Calling” is a great speed metal anthem cut from the same grain as “Nightbreaker” and classic Riot song “Warrior”. “Rolling Thunder”, the title track, and “Ghost Dance” follow suit with the same melodic approach, but not quite as fast and furious as the opening song. Other mid-tempo tracks such as “Blood of the English”, “Holy Land” and “Wounded Heart” rely on simple riffs and a solid bottom end to get a similar melodic message across. The Gary Moore cover “Out in the Fields” is also nicely done and fans of Helloween, Iron Savior and Gamma Ray in particular will like this as it bears a strong resemblance to several of the most accessible songs put out by those bands.

The brightest highlight of this album, however, is the riveting arrangement of the “Last of the Mohicans” that both opens and closes this album. The opener sets the tone for the rest of the album, while the closer showcases the amazing technical abilities of every member of the band; even the bass has an amazing solo on this one. The progression of the reprise is similar to a Baroque style Passacaglia (theme and variation) in that the bottom end is mostly constant while the guitars driven the radical thematic changes at the top end.

The album’s lyrical presentation is fairly objective, despite the tendency of some bands to simply bash their own country simply to alleviate their own personal sense of guilt. We don’t get any preachy lines about how wrong things were and how we should all feel ashamed, we are simply provided with an account of history. The subject matter is relevant to me (as was the subject of Inishmore for similar reasons) as I have ancestry going back to the plains peoples of the Lakota tribe, whom were enslaved by the Union government in the 19th century. However, one should also not discount the atrocities that Natives visited upon each other in their various skirmishes, nor the genocidal tendencies of the South American Indian nations (particularly the Aztecs). I am not one to glorify the primitive aspects of the past, nor do I wish to hunt tatanka in the fields as my ancestors did, and thankfully those whom will listen to this album will be spared the patronizing sympathy and historical revisionism that have become so prevalent into today’s society.

To any and all whom wish to hear a piece of Speed/Power Metal genius, this is a band who did it remarkably well in a time when everybody was drooling over bands like Green Day and No Doubt. If you like Power Metal, Traditional Metal, or anything that is riff driven and melodic, this is an album to have. Let the story it contains within greet you with the same message that the closing track leaves you with.

Exact Audio Copy V0.99 prebeta 5 from 4. May 2009

EAC extraction logfile from 6. July 2011, 14:49

RIOT / THE BRETHREN OF THE LONG HOUSE (Japan SRCS-7852)

Used drive : HL-DT-STDVDRAM GSA-H10A Adapter: 3 ID: 0

Read mode : Secure
Utilize accurate stream : Yes
Defeat audio cache : Yes
Make use of C2 pointers : No

Read offset correction : 667
Overread into Lead-In and Lead-Out : No
Fill up missing offset samples with silence : Yes
Delete leading and trailing silent blocks : No
Null samples used in CRC calculations : Yes
Used interface : Native Win32 interface for Win NT & 2000

Used output format : Monkey's Audio Lossless Encoder
Selected bitrate : High Lossless Compression
Quality : High
Add ID3 tag : Yes
Command line compressor : C:\Archivos de programa\Monkey's Audio\MAC.exe

TOC of the extracted CD

Track | Start | Length | Start sector | End sector
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––-
1 | 0:00.00 | 1:41.05 | 0 | 7579
2 | 1:41.05 | 5:11.65 | 7580 | 30969
3 | 6:52.70 | 3:56.15 | 30970 | 48684
4 | 10:49.10 | 4:58.47 | 48685 | 71081
5 | 15:47.57 | 3:56.00 | 71082 | 88781
6 | 19:43.57 | 5:23.73 | 88782 | 113079
7 | 25:07.55 | 4:02.72 | 113080 | 131301
8 | 29:10.52 | 3:49.73 | 131302 | 148549
9 | 33:00.50 | 5:49.17 | 148550 | 174741
10 | 38:49.67 | 5:35.45 | 174742 | 199911
11 | 44:25.37 | 3:57.00 | 199912 | 217686
12 | 48:22.37 | 4:47.53 | 217687 | 239264
13 | 53:10.15 | 6:26.15 | 239265 | 268229

Range status and errors

Selected range

Filename D:\Música\EAC\Riot\The Brethren Of The Long House\RIOT - THE BRETHREN OF THE LONG HOUSE (Japan SRCS-7852).wav

Peak level 100.0 %
Range quality 100.0 %
Test CRC D0A181D2
Copy CRC D0A181D2
Copy OK

No errors occurred


AccurateRip summary

Track 1 accurately ripped (confidence 2) [CE4F4E9D]
Track 2 accurately ripped (confidence 2) [7C501E7A]
Track 3 accurately ripped (confidence 2) [233B84A4]
Track 4 accurately ripped (confidence 2) [89FF24FC]
Track 5 accurately ripped (confidence 2) [9EA33E7B]
Track 6 accurately ripped (confidence 2) [342B41C0]
Track 7 accurately ripped (confidence 2) [C6A22FD7]
Track 8 accurately ripped (confidence 2) [AC7C6B82]
Track 9 accurately ripped (confidence 2) [67FC8FB5]
Track 10 accurately ripped (confidence 2) [E22CEE79]
Track 11 accurately ripped (confidence 2) [8DAE16B3]
Track 12 accurately ripped (confidence 2) [191FD9BD]
Track 13 accurately ripped (confidence 2) [45F2A7B2]

All tracks accurately ripped

End of status report

Riot 1977 Rock City [Reissue 1993]
Riot 1979 Narita [Japan 1st Press, 1989]
Riot 1981 Fire Down Under [Japanese Ed. 1999]
Riot 1982 Restless Breed [Japanese Ed. 1999]
Riot 1983 Born In America [Japan 1st Press, 1989]
Riot 1988 Thundersteel [Japan 1st Press]
Riot 1989 Riot Live [Japan 1st Press]
Riot 1990 The Privilege Of Power [Japan 1st Press]
Riot 1993 Nightbreaker [Japanese Ed.]
Riot 1993 Star Box [Japan 1st Press]
Riot 1997 Inishmore [Japan Press, XRCN-2005]
Riot 1998 Shine On (Live) [Japan Press, XRCN-2025]
Riot 1999 Sons Of Society [Japanese Ed.]
Riot 2002 Through The Storm [Japanese Ed.]
Riot 2006 Army Of One [Japanese Ed.]
Riot 2011 Immortal Soul [Japanese Ed.]
Riot 2014 Unleash The Fire [Japanese Ed.]