Artist: "Misc."
Album: "Elvira's Heavy Metal Halloween"
Genre: Metal
Label: Compass Productions

Reviewer: -RoG-
Posted: 10/15/2009

Review: When I first picked up this CD from Target's Halloween section, I thought to myself, "Elvira and heavy metal, together on one album chock full o' Halloween tunes? Perfect!" Unfortunately, the old adage about not judging a book (or in this case, a CD) by its cover has proven to be true once again.

If you're as big a fan of Elvira as I am, what with her hilarious one-liners filled to the brim with innuendo, you'll be sorely disappointed to learn that her vivacious voice is nowhere to be found on the entire album. Yes indeed, despite the fact that there's a photo of her sitting right on top of the title and the back of the CD boldly proclaims, "Elvira, Mistress of the Dark, presents twelve bone-crunching heavy metal renditions of Halloween's heaviest hits," you don't get to hear a single peep from her.

So that's an automatic deduction of half the points right there for a misleading promotion. When you see a Halloween album presented by Elvira, you expect to at LEAST hear a few samples of her voice somewhere in between tracks here 'n there. Hell, even a simple, "Hi, this is Elvira, Mistress of the Dark, and you're listening to Heavy Metal Halloween," would've been nice!

Well anyway, the music itself is fine for the most part. As a big fan of metal, I can assure you that the so-called "bone-crunching" sounds are not that at all. Oh sure, it's done in the metal style, but the guitar tone isn't crunchy like a true metal fan would want. Then again, if you're expecting amazing guitar distortion from a Halloween metal music CD made for Target stores, you should have your head examined.

The album is primarily instrumental, so it makes for a perfectly suitable backdrop to any Halloweeny antics you have going on. It's not the kind of album you'd really want to listen to all the way through, but having a few songs mixed in with a variety of other Halloween tunes on your playlist should do nicely.

So in the end, if you're looking for some metal renditions of some classic Halloween songs, this album is perfect for you. Just don't expect the lovely Elvira to be taking you from song to song.

Overall rating:
(Scored on a 0.5 - 5 pickles rating: 0.5 being the worst and 5 being the best)