Badger

Have you ever wondered why the fantastic retro-metal band ZUUL made a single in 2010 and chose to cover a BADGER song for the flipside? Doesn’t make much sense does it? Well, say goodbye to those sleepless nights of trying to figure out one of Life’s least greatest mysteries, because I can clear up that matter for you.

As I suspect many folks did, I first learned about BADGER’s ‘Over the Wall’ 7” EP while digging through Malc Macmillian’s ‘NWOBHM Encyclopedia’, which is how people learned about NWOBHM that wasn’t on the Neat label back before the internet became a mundane part of everyday life. Malc compared the band to CRUCIFIXION, which to me meant that ‘Over the Wall’ was quite possibly the most awesome thing ever recorded during the NWOBHM era, so of course I had to hear it. And eventually I did thanks to a collector sending me a CDR full of NWOBHM obscurities, which is how people actually heard NWOBHM that wasn’t on the Neat label back before YouTube became a mundane part of everyday life.

I was really, really happy I didn’t pay for a vinyl copy before I heard it. To this day I have no idea why Malc compared the band to CRUCIFIXION.

Let’s back up for a moment. The band released their first single under the banner of THE BADGER BELL BAND (yikes), and it featured 2 tunes that reeked of near-parody level barroom tripe. For their second release, ‘Over the Wall’, the renamed BADGER (which was an improvement for sure, though what does that say about their original moniker?) were trying for a somewhat more forceful delivery, which, when you added the rather gruff vocals and really simple song structures, gave the impression that the band was veering a bit into biker bar music. I guess they get points for trying to reinvent themselves in a more serious manner for this release. Musically, imagine SHOCK TREATMENT or DEMOLITION trying to get a bunch of soused wankers to raise a half-empty pint and sing along for a few moments before bellowing “Oi!” and passing out on their table and you’re getting the picture. Nevertheless, the short, simple songs and 1-dimmensional singalong nature of the tunes reinforced the ‘bar band’ mentality that had been firmly entrenched by the band’s highly dubious first slab of vinyl. ‘Over the Wall’ is the best of the three songs, but the other two are so immemorable that they set the bar pretty low. I’m still unimpressed with the release to this day. So how did a rather average song from a below average EP get covered by ZUUL in 2010?

Well, remember that CDR I mentioned earlier? Once upon a time I made several CDRs of obscure NWOBHM tracks for Mike Bushur, an old online buddy. For reasons I don’t recall, I included ‘Over the Wall’ on one of those CDRs for Mike…. and he loved the bloody song so much that his band ZUUL would later cover it for the B-side of their second single! And in a strange twist of fate that brings the whole BADGER circle to a close, Mike and the guys had covered CRUCIFIXION’s ‘On the Run’ on their first single, so apparently Malc wasn’t the only one who put BADGER on the same level as CRUCIFIXION.

The moral of the story is don’t put songs that you don’t like on CDRs for your friends because they might go immortalize them onto vinyl. Life’s funny that way.

Obskurer Release der recht selten anzutreffen ist. Charismatischer Saenger der die Songs unverwechselbar macht. Over the wall ist definitiv das highlight der Single, Faceless Gang faellt ein bisschen ab, weiss aber immer noch zu ueberzeugen. Der live track Runaway ist ein Durchschnittsrocker und als Fueller zu betrachten.