Dagger-Mainline Riders 7"

High Roller Records
2013

Stockholm, Sweden's very own Dagger, which falls squarely in the category of side-projects that should be warmly welcomed with open arms and opened wallets, was formed in 2009 by some like-minded musicians. Ripped straight from their Facebook profile, which is where I found the bulk of information about Dagger anyway (as their promo profile section was as empty as my checking account) the group's influences include Rainbow, Thin Lizzy, Black Sabbath, Deep Purple, Whitesnake, Riot, Iron Maiden, MSG, Whishbone Ash, Dio, Scorpions, Accept, Judas Priest, Montrose, W.A.S.P., UFO, Blue Öyster Cult, ZZ Top and Saxon. Whew, that's more then enough influences to build your band around, but, for some reason, I walked away from this 2-track release thinking about The Rods and Fastway. Maybe it's just me though? Anyway, back to the band at hand and it's the day jobs of the musicians involved here that is really interesting. You've got Jani Kataja (Mangrove, Sideburn), David Blomqvist (Carnage, Dismember),  Tobias Cristiansson (Grave, Dismember) and Fred Estby (Necronaut, Dismember). With that said let's look at what everyone does in Dagger. Lead vocals are handled more then effectively by Jani Kataja while David Blomqvist takes his guitar and carefully crafts solos that are simple and yet more then satisfying as only a Swedish band knows how to! While the riffs are played with a restrained and subtle air of  passion without a solid rhythm section in place it could all easily fall apart. That's where David's former Dismember band mates Tobias Cristiansson (bass) and Fred Estby (drums) come in to play. The pair keeps everything  in check and together with lead vocalist Jani and guitarist David the four musicians plays fairly straight-forward, no-frills (but just enough thrills to leave you wanting more) hard rock/heavy metal. The fact that it comes packed with a very distinct old-school charm only adds to it's appeal so let's hope that Dagger releases more material then just these two songs by the time it's all said and done!

Find out more about Dagger here: https://www.facebook.com/daggerofficial

Order your own copy of "Mainline Riders" here: http://www.hrrshop.de/navi.php?suchausdruck=dagger+mainline&JTLSHOP=0jo33fdmtn00kpj5mfup0uaqc3