• AllMyVinyl #118
• Band: Krokus
• Album Title: Headhunter
• Release Date: 25 Apr 1983
• Date purchased: Unknown
• Location purchased: Unknown
• Color of vinyl: black
• Number of discs: 1
• Links: [ Wikipedia | Discogs | Band Website | Complete album on Youtube ]

Krokus is a band I remember well from the mid 80’s.  I bought a few Krokus albums back then (duh, this is one of them), but this was a band that never became one of those I followed over time.  I mean they should – it’s the kind of band I was really into back then.  But outside of this album from 1983 and the subsequent two albums over the following couple of years – I just didn’t stick with them.  They were founded by Chris von Rohr who is the only remaining founding member of the band.  Current vocalist Marc Storace was I believe their fourth if I follow their history right.  The first album he did was the 1980 album (their fourth overall).   He has been the vocalist nearly all the time since (there was one album in the middle there with Carl Senteance on vocals).  Their overall lineup in the history of the band has a LOT of people going through it.  The current incarnation has 6 guys in it (and they’re touring the band’s 50th anniversary in 2025).  However, if you go to Wikipedia and look at the list of former members, it totals 30 others. So there’s a lot of history beyond the 3 albums I knew in the mid to late 80’s for sure.

Overall, Krokus has 18 studio albums.  The first was a self titled album released in 1976, and the most recent was called “Big Rocks” and released in 2017.  The album before this one (1982’s One Vice at a Time) had the track “Long Stick Goes Boom“, which was probably when I first heard of them.  That’s a good song, but IMO it has a lot to do with Krokus’ overall reputation of being an AC/DC clone.  Now I don’t agree with that completely – you can’t be a clone for 50 years and 18 albums.  However, my ears aren’t ignorant of the similarities.  It must have floated around in the back of my head somewhere because a decade ago or so when Brian Johnson had to come off the AC/DC tour, I floated the idea of Marc Storace fronting AC/DC, as he does sound a bit like Bon Scott.   Anyway, I’m not here to write about AC/DC, but Krokus.

Rolling back around to Headhunter, the title track and Screaming in the Night are the big draws here.  I remember seeing music videos for them on MTV, which is probably why I went out and bought this on vinyl.  This one is another survivor of my mom’s basement, so I’m playing my OG copy from 1983.  It’s interesting when I play one of these old ones as the vinyl is much thinner than more recent albums.   As I look at the albums’ track listing, I know the two tracks I mentioned and one other (because it’s a cover of a famous track), but the rest of the album is an unknown to me, so I’ll be curious to see how 2025 me reacts to music I obviously liked 42 years ago.  Mostly that still works, though – I mean it was me after all.  haha

One thing about the album in general is that it was produced by Tom Allom.  Tom is well known for his work with Judas Priest and Black Sabbath, so this has a bit of a heavier sound than they were generally putting out at the time.  Allom produced the first three Black Sabbath albums – all masterpieces.  He’s done some of my favorite Priest albums (British Steel, Defenders of the Faith, Firepower – and a lot more).  Man knows his shit.  But this is the only Krokus album he ever did.  Allom alone isn’t why this album is good – a producer can’t make a bad band great, but it does contribute to the overall sound.  Now I’m not saying Krokus is bad in any way, just talking about producer skills there.   Kind of talked myself into a corner there – didn’t mean to.  But Allom was a net positive to this album for sure.

Headhunter – The album leads off with the title track.  It starts off with a drum intro that reminds me of something that Cozy Powell would do.  I could easily see Cozy doing this drum intro, so that’s a positive right out of the gate.  I like the rhythm section that runs behind this.  The guitar sound feels a bit back in the mix.  I wonder if that’s just 1983 or it was intentional.  I do like the song, but feel the guitar sound wasn’t as far up in the mix as it could be.  Some nice screaming by Storace at parts in the song – especially when singing the song title.  One of those songs where the lyrics are a complete unknown – can’t tell you what any of them are even listening to the song now.  Guitar solo seemed a bit restrained. Good fast paced song to open up the album with a nice beat to go with it. Song has a hard cut ending, which I quite liked here.

Eat the Rich – Aerosmith has a song by the same title, but they have nothing to do with each other.   I very much enjoy the riff here.  It’s also far catchier than the first song on the album.  If I was going to try introducing someone to Krokus I’d use this song, as it’s one of my fav things.  4:15 long, good riff, good solo, and catchy as hell in the chorus.  When sitting down for this album today it’s one of the songs that I remembered in my head, but what I had forgotten was exactly how catchy the chorus is.  Good track, and I had to play it a second time when it finished.

Screaming in the Night – This song sounds to me like it was the most influenced by what Tom Allom brought to the table from the early days of Sabbath.  Now this isn’t Black Sabbath – not even close, but if you know what he Krokus sound was around this time, you’ll get what I mean – this is a longer (6:38), slower, darker song.   While Krokus will never BE Black Sabbath, I get some vibes from that era of Sabbath from this song.  It’s still Krokus of course, but..  oh hell, just listen to it, you’ll get it.  One of their more popular songs, too, which was nice to hear.

Ready to Burn – This song is a faster paced track – it’s a simple riff, not a lot of musical variance here – but then they don’t all have to be a trendsetter.   It’s a 3:54 fast track, it starts with a specific riff and sound and sticks with it.   Catchy track in the chorus, but probably not a song that will make most people’s “Top 10 Krokus songs” track lists.  :)

Night Wolf – When I read this on the track listing, I was reminded of a song by Waysted called “Night of the Wolf“, so I kind of subconsciously judged this song on that.  Unfair, I admit, but that’s where my brain went.  Still, I like the Krokus song of the same name.  It’s a faster paced riff – a nice on that got me tapping of my foot right at the start.  It does have a bit of a corny “Wolf sound” in it, which is a bit of a “Mr. Spock eyebrow raise” – but ignoring that, the rest of the song works for me.   It’s kind of like Ready to Burn a bit in that it has one musical idea that it rides from start to front, but this time it works for me.  It also has a nice guitar solo as well, so this is a thumbs up from me.

Stayed Awake All Night – Now this track I have to confess for the longest time I thought was a Krokus track.  I though “Hey, this has a different vibe then their usual stuff”.   It wasn’t until much later on that I found out it’s not their song, it’s a BTO song – track was originally written by Randy Bachman (BTO, The Guess Who).  As covers go, it’s pretty darned good.  My brain tells me it’s a BTO song, and a friend of mine who is a HUGE Guess Who fan gives me that bitter beer face look when I tell him I prefer the Krokus version to the BTO original – as this was my first exposure to the track.

Stand and Be Counted – Like this beat right from the start.  Has a feel like it’s not just another track on the album.  Some good riffing mixed with a nice vocal delivery.  Good track.  Sounds like it’s from the era it was created in, which isn’t bad as I grew up with this stuff. Played this a second time when it was done – I apparently enjoyed it more than I remembered – a pleasant surprise for sure.

White Din – A 1:49 instrumental.  It’s not REALLY a lead in to Russian Winter, as there’s a hard break in-between them, so I’m not sure why this was here.

Russian Winter – This song reminds me a bit of Accept (with Udo).  The is 3:33, and I felt it could have easily been double the length.  Was really getting into it, and here comes the end of song fade out.  Much like Counted, this was a big surprise to me, really enjoyed it.  It closes out the album with one of my favorites – 3 and a half minutes long, fast track, good riffing, foot stomping good time.

In summary this is what I kind of remembered.  A fair hard rock album from the early 80’s.  That it’s produced by Tom Allom probably helped here.  The tracks I remembered from the past (Eat the Rich, Screaming, Headhunter) are pretty much no surprise.  What WAS a surprise was the two full tracks that close out the album – Stand and Be Counted & Russian Winter I had completely forgotten about, and were excellent.  As I said earlier, Krokus is still around now and still going, I should probably check out their newer stuff.  I fully admit to losing track of them after the 80’s, so that’s 8 full studio albums of material I have no knowledge of.  Anyone following me who is a long time Krokus fan have any recommendations from the 90’s and onward material? I chose one track at random, and liked it – so let me know.  I own one other Krokus album on vinyl – it’s the one after this (86’s “The Blitz”), but that one is pretty derided by Krokus fans, so I’ll be curious to see what my reaction is when I get there.

I probably owe it to Krokus to check that shit out as I honestly only knew them as a band with a couple of hits in the 80’s that sounded a lot like AC/DC.   That they’re still around after all this time tells me they’re far more than just that.