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Review: Accept - Restless and Wild
Accept
www.acceptworldwide.com
Restless and Wild

Label: Brain Records
Year released: 1982
Duration: 43:49
Tracks: 10
Genre: Heavy Metal

Rating:
4.75/5


Review online: August 26, 2021
Reviewed by: MetalMike
Readers' Rating
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Rated 4.93/5 (98.67%) (15 Votes)
Review

Restless and Wild, Accept's fourth album, was the first one I remember as being widely available here in the United States, though many of us found it only after the success of Balls to the Wall. While it is very much a companion album to its more famous successor, it is often regarded as the better of the two and after revisiting it several times in the past few weeks, I can understand that sentiment.

The album opens with "Fast as a Shark", a song I would nominate for the best Accept has ever written. From the fade-out German drinking song intro to Udo Dirkschneider's opening scream, to the blistering riff courtesy of Wolf Hoffman (Herman Frank is listed on the album's credits but didn't actually play on it) and the bombastic rhythm section, this is a nearly perfect metal song. I can remember hearing it on the radio late one night and wondering what the hell was going on until the needle scratch followed by the scream and riff and having the top of my head taken clean off. This song is followed by classic Accept cuts like "Restless and Wild", "Ahead of the Pack" and "Flash Rockin' Man" on which the band pounds out metallic gold like dwarves turn out magic armor. Proving that they weren't about bombast alone, Accept showed an ability to write songs that reached listeners beyond the core metal community with the supremely catchy "Don't Go Stealing My Soul Away" and the haunting ballad "Princess of the Dawn".

Dirkscheider's sandpapery vocals combined with the neoclassical guitar work of Hoffman, who studied classical music for the first three years of his guitar lessons, combine to create a sound often imitated but never duplicated. Balls to the Wall is indisputably the band's more well-known release, deservedly so filled as it is with classic '80s metal, but Restless and Wild is at least its equal. Maybe you prefer the socially conscious message on Balls to the Wall or maybe you like the more conventionally "metal" lyrics of Restless and Wild. Either way, both albums are classics of '80s heavy metal. Restless and Wild, along with Balls to the Wall and perhaps Blood of the Nations (the band's first with new singer Mark Tornillo) should be owned by all metal fans.

More about Accept...
Review: Balls to the Wall (reviewed by Pierre Bégin)
Review: Blind Rage (reviewed by MetalMike)
Review: Blood of the Nations (reviewed by MetalMike)
Review: Metal Blast From The Past (reviewed by Pierre Bégin)
Review: Metal Heart (reviewed by Christian Renner)
Review: Stalingrad (reviewed by MetalMike)
Review: Staying A Life (reviewed by Pierre Bégin)
Review: The Rise of Chaos (reviewed by MetalMike)
Review: The Rise of Chaos (reviewed by Michel Renaud)
Review: Too Mean to Die (reviewed by Michel Renaud)
Interview with Wolf Hoffmann (Guitars) on October 16, 2010 (Interviewed by MetalMike)
Interview with guitarist Wolf Hoffmann on June 15, 2015 (Interviewed by Luxi Lahtinen)
Interview with guitarist Wolf Hoffmann on July 22, 2017 (Interviewed by Luxi Lahtinen)
Interview with guitarist Wolf Hoffmann on February 16, 2023 (Interviewed by Luxi Lahtinen)
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