Rocka Rollas
The Road To Destruction

January 2015
Released: 2014, StormSpell Records
Rating: 4.0/5
Reviewer: JP

Good ol’ Cederik keeps grinding it out in the trenches in the eternal war against crappy music and he has struck another blow for the good guys. It has only been 13 months since the bands second album METAL STRIKES BACK was released and here we are on THE ROAD TO DESTRUCTION. I’ve written a number of longer reviews about the various bands created by Cederik, so this time I’ll skip the history lesson and just focus on the album. If you to learn more, please feel free to read my reviews of his other recent works, Breitenhold and the last Rocka Rollas album.



There are a few changes since the last album. Rocka Rollas seems to be evolving a bit more into a band. Before it was just Cederik and a singer and Ced would do everything. Now, there are guys in the band. The other key difference is that Ced has taken over the vocals as well. His vocals are higher and delivered with a bit more frantic energy than the previous vocalist, who was still world-class. Aside from that, the band still kills, the album cover looks awesome and the band is still on StormSpell Records.



THE ROAD TO DESTRUCTION is a compact eight songs 43 minutes with one intro and one cover and odd but decent choice, the 1978 Magnum cut ‘Kingdom Of Madness’. That song came out over a decade before Cede was born so it seems he has studied his Dad’s old vinyl collection well! Other highlights are a guest guitar solo by Janne Stark (Overdrive) on the cut ‘With Fire And Sword’. Fans will notice the song ‘The War Of Steel Has Begun’ which was the title of the debut Rocka Rollas album but the song did not appear on the that record.



The eight original songs are all speed metal, fist-bangin’ mania with guitars-a-blazin’ and throats-a-wailin’. Big catchy choruses like on ‘A Wave Of Firestorms’ lead the charge and in my mind this is a highlight track, kind of tying in thematically with the album cover depicting a knight rising a firestorm. ‘Firefall’ is a little bit slower but still grinds that Metal grind so well. The bands love of Running Wild still shines through many of the tracks and that is a good thing!



It seems that Rocka Rollas perfected their vision to capture the sound of 80’s speed Metal perfectly very early on in their career, so in truth there is little variation in the bands signature sound. That’s good because I hate it when a band changes for no reason and hides behind lame excuses of ‘growth’, ‘maturity’ or ‘artistic expression’. Just play Metal! That is what Rocka Rollas do.