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In my review of Zero Down's last album, Looking to Start a Riot, I wondered why no label had signed these guys. Someone at Minotauro Records must have been thinking the same thing and they picked up the band's fourth record, No Limit to the Evil. Nice to see a deserving band get a shot at the brass ring and grab it.

No Limit to the Evil is mostly a continuation of the Hard Rock/Heavy Metal found on Looking to Start a Riot. The music remains in the vein of early U.S. Metal once mined by Motley Crue, W.A.S.P. and others before Glam took over the scene. Straightforward anthems like "Steve McQueen" (keeping the slight tongue-in-cheek vibe of the last album) are mixed with speedier pure Heavy Metal tracks like "Phantom Host" or "Two Ton Hammer" and slower, more groove-oriented (in a good way) songs like "Leche di Tigre." The songwriting is on par with Looking to Start a Riot and that may be the most damning thing about No Limit to the Evil. There isn't much in the way of progress in spite of label backing.

That's certainly a small gripe and fans of Traditional Heavy Metal with a Hard Rock edge aren't going to find stuff much better than what Zero Down serves up on No Limit to the Evil. And I still bet these guys are a lot of fun live.