Stryper – Fallen (2015)

Stryper - Fallen (2015)

Christianity as an ‘attack’ on metal might not be as trendy as it used to be, but Stryper never got the message. They reformed in 2003, and someone out there has to be buying their albums, right? The Billboard 200 seems to think so, and the existence of Fallen means, at the very least, that there is still an audience of Christian evangelists that a shrewd marketer can take advantage of. Add to that a more technically skilled visual artist for your cover and some minor updates to your image to make you trendy for this decade, and you get a more religiously acceptable way to listen to some modern pop music and then quickly forget about it.

Make no mistake about it – Stryper is certainly Christian propaganda. I don’t think anyone goes to Stryper looking for an intelligent portrayal of Christianity’s tenets (as opposed to said propaganda), but I could be mistaken about this. They certainly won’t succeed, because Fallen sticks to a fairly basic set of lyrical/ideological templates. A couple of songs here are simple retellings of scriptural events. A few others are songs of victimhood and impending eternal salvation, which are also theologically shallow. Like many other Christian musicians, Stryper also falls victim to the tendency to write thinly disguised secular love songs, but that’s hardly a selling point. I wasn’t expecting otherwise from this band, but given how many anti-Christian bands fall through the DMU meat grinder, it’s occasionally interesting to see another side’s agitprop in comparison to their rough equivalent here, like generic simplified Satanic or nationalist themes.

Backing this up is a fairly generic hard rock band that admittedly trends more pompous and theatrical than average for the style. This is likely a throwback to the band’s “glam” past, but it makes for an understandably vocal heavy experience. Michael Sweet is a reasonably talented singer, but he seems to obsess with multitracking his voice, especially during Fallen‘s multitude of Big Dumb Choruses™. Besides the vox, there really isn’t much to latch onto here. It’s possible that more traditional metal technique has crept back into Stryper’s sound since their halcyon days of commercial success in the 1980s, but with 30 years of production wizardry in the mean time, it can be hard to tell. The band also throws in a cover of Black Sabbath’s “After Forever” for what are presumably lyrical reasons, and even in its more vocally bombastic form here, it outdoes Fallen‘s originals in mood and organization. It does not bode well for you to be outdone by your choice of covers.

In the long run, Stryper is too inoffensive to draw my hatred, but I am certain the local community will be more than willing to savage this album.

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19 thoughts on “Stryper – Fallen (2015)”

  1. Collapse Observer says:

    10,000 cocks slapping in Jehovah’s mouth

  2. Daniel Maarat says:

    Stop reviewing pop and review Ares Kingdom’s The Unburiable Dead.

    1. hypcrite says:

      Second.

  3. Boris the Cupcake says:

    I always masturbate to the fantasy of having Jesus´s cock fucking me from behind. But it’s weird because in my dream, Jesus is Pantera´s lead guitarist.

  4. Reginald says:

    Ironically, it was Stryper — in like 1987 — that got me interested in the heavier side of music, setting me on a path leading to all this evil black/death shit. So they’re kinda working at cross purposes.

    “To Hell with the Devil” was the first cassette that gave the child-me that transgressive thrill of: “Shit, don’t let mom discover this!”

    I KNOW you guys remember that feeling!

  5. Poser Patrol says:

    Try Trouble – Psalm 9 for Christian themed metal that doesn’t involve lapping up cum from Christ’s jew chode.

  6. Booooo says:

    Thumbs down to this album and review. Less gossip/drama and glam rock and more writings on actual metal (even if its bad). That shaving article was stupid.

    1. Feel free to submit articles on metal topics.

  7. I blew my head off like Per Ohlin says:

    Can we have an Opeth fan fic contest, like the one for Panterrible?

    1. You’d have to ask the editor. My hope, while I am vigilantly anti-PC, is that it will not turn into the type of event where anti-homosexual feeling becomes the mainstay of its criticism. Opeth are effete metrosexuals designed for cuck petit bourgeois, yes, but we need to avoid insulting homosexuals by implying they have anything to do with Opeth. I’d be open to quality Opeth/Stryper slash fic however. Bonus points if Manowar show up fully oiled.

      1. Daniel Maarat says:

        Opeth’s audience is guys who moved from Pantera to dad rock and want placid, wife-acceptable wuss rock that lets them feel more smarterer than Dismember fans.

        1. They wish to be deep (in addition to “bro”).

      2. Gabe Kagan says:

        I figure that there are plenty of sexual activities we could explore in an Opeth fanfiction contest, so feel free to use your imagination or trusted fetish website for inspiration.

        That being said, creating a contest requires some organizational effort and planning, so I will want to confer with Brett before officially announcing anything on that front.

  8. Nuclear Whore says:

    I liked this article. The 2nd paragraph the most interesting :D

    Thanks!

  9. mlotek says:

    Stryper rock

  10. Ace says:

    Musically the album is far, far better than the reviewer lets on. Not really a fair review as he is blinded by anti religious thoughts.

    1. Doug Killjoy says:

      It’s not that they’re religious, it’s that they’re the religious equivalent of Warrant, with a dubious history of sappy, unlistenable songs. I can understand why they’d want to inject some religious authenticity with the Black Sabbath cover, but of course they wouldn’t touch Into The Void or Mob Rules.

  11. Rr says:

    What a dipshit! This album is good music, too bad you’re so narrow minded and prejudiced you can’t give an unbiased review here. But we don’t care, we like the album anyway.
    The Sabbath song on this album actually is for “people like you” read the lyrics to after forever.

  12. Eddy Ramos says:

    Surely can’t take this review serious. Why bother the lyrics so much while most metal bands have biblical references in the songs one way or other. It’s the music right? Which is a masterpiece. Stryper’s former record even so!

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