Customer Reviews

Dogs of War

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

If Iron Maiden and Def Leppard were the two most successful bands to come out of the New Wave Of British Heavy Metal in the late '70's and early '80's, a great time for real metal fans, then Saxon probably is the most underrated, at least in the US.
Maiden has hung tough, thanks to a ferocious following, and Def Leppard ceased to be metal after their first two albums. Saxon has retained enough of a primarily European audience to remain active to this day. Metal is a strange beast - the music is the most confining in all of rock, but those who excel enjoy life spans that far exceed most any other genre.
Saxon's reissue of 1995's "Dogs Of War" defiantly retains the classic metal sound they helped forge, thanks in part to being influenced by Judas Priest and Thin Lizzy, to name a few seminal metal bands. Biff Byford's vocals and lyrics remain the cornerstone of the Saxon sound, but his voice has aged noticeably to more of a boozy Bon Scott style tone, especially on "Big Twin Rolling".
The guitars are sharp and thankfully have not copped out to the dropped "D" grunge tuning that took over damn near every heavy band in the '90's. The title track should be plenty heavy enough for anybody, and I must admit it takes balls to record a very '80's sounding pop-metal tune on "Hold On."
"Great White Buffalo" and "Walking Through Tokyo" show how bands weren't afraid to stretch their creative wings at one time, and bully for Saxon for doing it.
All in all, "Dogs Of War" is a fine latter day effort from a band that deserves much more credit than they've received over the years.

Band line-ip here:
Biff - vocals
Graham OLiver - guitar (his last album with Saxon)
Paul Quinn - guitar
Nibbs Carter - bass
Nigel Glockler - drums

After trying to change their sound a lot for the American market, and obtaining a nule result, SAXON at last decided to go back to form: straigh heavy metal, but THEIR kind of heavy metal> British, original, muscular, strong.

DOGS OF WAR is a pleasant surprise. It's well crafted, well produced (by Bii and Ransel Hainer). It only has one sadreminiscence of their utterly commercial period back in the middle eighties, the commercial pop metal song "Hold on". But, due to the sheer quality of the alum, this mistep is easily forgotten!

Long Live SAXON!

Originally released in 1995, Dogs of War was the twelfth studio album from British heavy metal pioneers Saxon. Once one of the forerunners of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal (NWOBHM) movement, Saxon struggled as the `80s gave way to the `90s. After a couple of less than impressive attempts at mainstream radio success, the band used this album to move back towards a more metal sound.

Dogs of War doesn't quite find the band recapturing the glory of their NWOBHM years, but it does rock a bit more than Destiny and Innocence Is No Excuse. Aside from the metal anthems "Dogs of War" and "Demolition Alley," this album seems like an odd cross between Thin Lizzy and the blues rock Samson did so well. The emphasis is definitely more on melody and soulful vocals rather than fist-pumping heavy metal. Sometimes this works well (see "The Great White Buffalo" and "Give It All Away") and other times it's just not pretty ("Don't Worry"), but overall there's a lot to like about Dogs of War.

It's not an essential album like Saxon's early albums (or their post-2000 albums), but Dogs of War is still an enjoyable hard rock album. Besides, even an average Saxon album is still well worth owning if you're into British metal.

Edition Notes: SPV reissued Dogs of War in 2006, adding expanded liner notes and a pair of bonus tracks, live versions of "The Great White Buffalo" and "Denim and Leather." It's not an essential reissue, so if you have the previous version there probably isn't much need to upgrade to this one. For those of us who missed it the first time around though, the Dogs of War reissue is ideal.

Despite being overshadowed by Solid Ball of Rock and Unleash the Beast, Dogs of War remains one of my favourite albums. The perfect blend between the classic hard rock and heavy metal sound Saxon have always wavered between. The songs Dogs of War and The Great White Buffalo show Saxon are as capable as Iron Maiden of powering out historically inspired metal epics when at their best.

Burning Wheels, Big Twin Rolling, Hold On and Demolition Alley are classic rock tracks - reminiscent of Australian pub rockers AC/DC and The Angels. For 1995 this is brilliant stuff, and i wish more bands would write this sort of material! The only songs i skip are Don't Worry, because its just weak, and Walking Through Tokyo, which is good but a little uninteresting.

Saxon took on a full on, heavy metal sound after this album, so this is the perfect album to close the band's classic rock era. Recommended.

1995's DOGS OF WAR is their best album since 1983's POWER AND THE GLORY. It runs close with 1984's CRUSADER. The only album that got closer to it is their recent release, KILLING GROUND. Both 1997's UNLEASH THE BEAST and 1999's METALHEAD are inferior to DOGS OF WAR.

Biff has the help of drummer GLockler in writing the lyrics (Glockler is no longer in the band, since after UNLEASH THE BEAST- Fritz Randow is ints place). Also, this is the last alum featuring founding member guitarrist Graham Oliver. It's such a shame that Oliver, ex-bassits Steve Dawson and drummer Pete Gill would come to fight bitterly against Biff and Paul Quinn for the right of using the name SAXON!!

I'll listen to any Saxon album just because they're that damn good. Dogs of War is no exception, its traditional Saxon kickin butt and taking names. The best song on this baby is Yesterdays Gone with one mean riff that runs continually throughout the whole song, pushing it along. This is one that should go on any best of complimation albums. All this talk about Def Leppard and Iron Maiden ticks me off, neither one can stand up to Saxon's long standing metal attack. Thanks Saxon for all the great metal youve given us. If there is anyone out there who hasnt yet experienced the sound of Saxon what are you waiting for?

One of their best latter-day Saxon releases! of you like the genre, you'll enjoy this.

Released in 1995 "Dogs Of War" is Saxon's third studio album from the nineties decade following 1992's "Forever Free" and 1990's "Solid Ball Of Rock" both of which were quite good. Just for the record this was original Saxon guitarist Graham Oliver's last release with the band. He would later join up with ex-Saxon bassist Steve Dawson to form another band which after a long battling lawsuit over the Saxon name lost out and called themselves "Oliver-Dawson's Saxon". "Dogs Of War" contains some pretty good rockers such as the self titled track as well as "The Great White Buffalo", "Big Twin Rolling (Coming Home)", "Burning Wheels" and "Give It All Away". Now don't expect another "Wheels Of Steel", "Denim And Leather" or "Strong Arm Of The Law" all of which are classic Saxon albums. But remember this is a nineties Saxon and their NWOBHM (New Wave Of British Heavy Metal) roots is pretty much non-existant here. But you can't deny it's a pretty hard rocking cd which paves the way to the band's next studio release "Unleash The Beast" which is far better.

Dogs of War could be said to be the album that saved their fans from leaving them for good, after so many albums were released so close together with such poor performance. It started their slow rise with other great albums such as Unleash the Beast and Lionheart and shows what the new Saxon could truly do.
The first song, and the title song "Dogs of War" is what Saxon is all about, the intro drums and guitar rifts are heavy, hard and just what is needed to start off the album.
The second song "Burning Wheels" follows the first song in terms of excelence, but with a very much different path of music style, and is a reminder of their classic stuff from "Wheels of Steel" and "Strong Arm of the Law"
After these songs however, the tracks become less great with each one, "Yesterdays Gone" is a good end song but the others have already stopped its chances of being a perfect album.
If you are new to saxon then i would not recommend this album, because you will think that this is all they are made of. If you can get the song "Dogs of War" then you are set, but the others do not seem worth it.
I would recommend either their next album "Unleash the Beast" or any one of their first five. The only reason i gave it 4 stars is just because of the song "Dogs of War", it is now one of my favourite Saxon songs.

"Dogs of War" is a pleasant return to straight ahead metal from this pionering NWOBHM act.A very heavy SAXON outing with solid song writing,fine production and blazing axework by veterans Paul Quinn and since departed Graham Oliver make this release SAXON's best release of the 90's. Vocalist Biff Byford, with his unique voice and lyrics, further cements his reputation as one of the greatest metal frontmen of all time. Veteran drummer Nigel Glockler shows he is still a great player while bassist Nibbs Carter's energetic style adds a lot to the material and this lineup. With new classics like "The Great White Buffalo", "Dogs of War" and "Hold On" SAXON has found there way back musically to no nonsense true metal.Every track straight out rocks on "Dogs Of War" without any throw away tunes in sight.This album will no doubt please old SAXON fans and hopefully add some new ones as well.Essential cd for all SAXON fans as well as fans of classic NWOBHM style metal.