Metal Church seems to have been cursed in their existence. One could slap on the old platitude, "Always the bridesmaid, never the bride" and anyone familiar with their career would know precisely what is meant. The band suffered many lineup changes and ultimately watched the music scene in Washington explode into superstardom with them standing on the sidelines, the ultimate "uncool" band in a grunge world. The tragic thing is that the band had been releasing quality albums for years while never attaining access to the next level, unless you consider guitarist John Marshall's occasional stints as live guitarist for Metallica while James Hetfield was injured as getting to the next level.

Blessing In Disguise should have been the album that pushed the band over the hump. Although the band saw original vocalist David Wayne and founding guitarist Kurdt Vanderhoof leave (Vanderhoof did remain in a working relationship with the rest of the band, providing quite a bit of songwriting), the replacements, the aforementioned Marshall and new singer Mike Howe, were more the satisfactory new team members. Howe possessed a mighty, Dio-esque, throaty voice that discarded some of the silly stereotypical metal vibratto and tailings, but offered a meaty jab. The music on Blessing in Disguise falls between stylistic boxes, being not quite thrash, not quite speed metal, but rumbles along in a very efficient way. The songs covered a range of topics, from the sinking of the Titanic ("Rest in Pieces (April 15, 1912)"), to modern health care ("Fake Healer") to homelessness and derangement (the token "ballad" of "Anthem to the Estranged"). Most of the songs are at least pretty darned good, but "Badlands" excels above the rest with a great tempo and smart use of overlaying an acoustic guitar during sections of it. The production is a tad flat, muddying up the bottom end a bit more than necessary, but overall is fairly clear.

On a whole, Blessing in Disguise was one of the better metal releases for 1989 and that was with quite a bit of stiff competition from their contemporaries. Metal Church should have received more recognition from the metal world with this release, but it seemed their career was on the slow track to obscurity from this point on. Regardless, a fine release for those with an interest in 80s metal.

Review date: 06/2001

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