Scorpions Album: “Animal Magnetism [Remaster]”

Got this album on cassette in the mail from RCA in the early 80's and soon realized what a fine slab of metal I had bought. The production is very raw and the guitar riffs are the best of any Scorpions album. Make It Real, Falling In Love, The Zoo, and Only A Man rock hard. The title track is slow and hypnotizing. The sole ballad Lady Starlight contains some great Micheal Schenker style playing (hmmmmm?). Taken By Force, Blackout, Virgin Killer, and Love Drive should also be part of your collection!

Animal Magnetism is a gem of a hard rock/heavy metal album. If you don't own any Scorpions' music, you simply have to have this album as well as 79's Lovedrive (the album that preceded this) and 82's Blackout (the album that followed this). Though this album contains a well-balanced mix, the guitars are not quite as upfront as they are on Blackout. If Animal Magnetism had the same mix as Blackout, it would be the greatest album in the Scorpions (Mach II) catalogue.

For the un-Scorpified out there, Scorpions were a very different band prior to 1979. From 1972-1978 the band was much more progressive and heavier in the "spacey-head-music" sense. Mach I Scorpions is a treat unto its own, but probably not as digestible in a pop sense.

Animal Magnetism, the 2nd of Mach II's efforts, oozes all the ingredients that make Scorpions who they are: sensuality, energy, hooks and strong hard rock musicianship. To me, Scorpions are the progenitors of the hard rock "ballad." While most bands that write ballads give you the sense that they were forced to do so by their producer and / or their label, Scorpions write ballads because that's who they are; songwriters that enjoy writing ballads. No band writes ballads the way Scorpions do because no one can sing a ballad the way Klaus Meine can.

Ahh, but can they rock? Oh yes indeed! Animal Magnetism has the perfect blend of mid-tempo rockers (Make It Real, Twentieth Century Man,Hold Me Tight, etc.), blistering rockers (the Zoo, Don't Make No Promises) and, as mentioned, a truly tremendous, emotionally charged ballad (Lady Starlight). The solo played by Rudolph Schenker at the end of Lady Starlight is worth the price of the album itself.

Another noteworthy element on Animal Magnetism is the fact that this is the last album on which Klaus Meine really belted out truly heavy (in the rough sounding sense) vocals (listen to Hold Me Tight and Don't Make No Promises) In fact, he may have overdone it because before the next album was done, he had to stop singing for a period of time and seek medical treatment to remove nodules from his vocal chords! Though obviously Klaus Meine's vocals remain strong to this day, he seemed to be a different vocalist after Animal Magnetism.

Purchase and enjoy a hard rock masterpiece.

This is the second in the "Mach 2" version of this fine German Metal Band from Germany featuring the very talented lead guitar skills of Matthias Jabs. Right off the bat, for you Guitarists out there like myself, I am a HUGE Michael Schenker Fan, and loved what he did on Lovedrive, and have to admit that Matthias did a more than adequate job filling the Scorps need for a Melodic and emotive Guitarist like Michael. In my opinion, this is the best Scorpions Album of what myself and a lot of fans refer to as the "Triumvirate" of the best 3 albums [Lovedrive/Animal Magnetism/Blackout] of their entire career. Of course, it could be argued by a Scorpions Purist, that the earlier Ulrich Roth material was far edgier and Progressive sounding without a care in the World to pandering to commercial tastes, but I digress... Songwise, this is the strongest of the 3 albums mentioned above with the hard rock songs here just pummeling you like giant Ball Peen Hammer - if built by Porsche. This songwriting to me is the very essence of great Hard Rock craftsmanship. Memorable Guitar hooks that never leave you, pounding and tasty Bass and Drums with songs that straddle that very difficult balance (that almost EVERY Metal Band in the late 80's failed miserably at...) between being memorable without being too Radio-Friendly, and great chops for a Musician like me to appreciate and be inspired by. Lady Starlight as a Ballad is a very sweet song that thankfully Klaus has the sensitivity to deliver without sounding like a "Metal Dude" that had to throw in a "soft song" to appease the record company and the Girls in the fan base. For those of you that appreciate a clean, punchy Mix as I do, the record sounds great with all the instruments balanced perfectly with no trace of muddiness in evidence - even more impressive considering the heavy Bass mix and energetic Kick-Drum from Herman! MUCH credit is due to Dieter Dierks as Producer, as he did a wonderful job polishing these already great songs and making everything sound as clear as a bell. To sum up, these songs are top-notch, the recording/mix will impress you, but most imoprtantly, this kind of simple but hooky Hard Rock sonwriting like this along with early Y&T, Montrose, UFO, etc., is sadly a thing of the past. This is Scorpions in their finest hour. All you have to do now is buy the remastered CD and fire up your giant Pioneer speakers from the 70's and bliss out to the greatest era in hard rock history. Trust me.

This is one of the Scorpions best overall CDs. The guitar riffs are classic and the guitar sound is hard and crisp. "The Zoo", of course, is a standout with its slow crunchy riff and Klaus talking and whispering the verses as much as singing them. "Make it Real" is fast paced with another great riff that gets the CD started off perfectly. Every song will have you jamming along with it. "Lady Starlight" is a ballad which a lot of people seem to like but it doesn't do anything for me. It's the only song on the CD that I sometimes skip. If you're a Scorpions fan, you have to have Animal Magnetism.

This is a great cd to grab; as this is metal at's most melodic, fun and well sung and played. !980 was a great year for rock and roll and this one stood up quite well in that fantastic year (musically). It's cover though is dumb ; but who cares, they were out to grab your attention. The music though is just great. There's not a bad song on here. And for metal fans this was one of the highpoints of 1980!. (time moves on but good music remains) The scorps previous one 'lovedrive' had really broken them in the U.S. and had introduced this type of sound that was moving away from the psych rock hendrix influenced metal of their excellent earlier releases. Everyone here is playing and singing to perfection and the scorps were masters of the newer type of melodic metal that was mirrored in the nwobm (new wave of british metal) that was raising and revitalizing metal completely. Instead of the more sloppily played nu metal of 15 years later which is ok this is classic metal with lots of punch. The zoo is the hardest slammer on this one and it still is wild to hear even today. Metal was wide open and often better sung and played than most of todays so it could capture many more fans percentage wise than todays generally. So this is worth grabbing and adding to your classic metal collection.