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Track Listing: Give it to Ya Straight Get Back, Stand Back No Longer Feel Tight Let the Metal Play If I had Your Love Rock & Roll Demon Claw to the Top Evil in Your Heart Love in the Shadows Friend or Foe Dark Star Rid of the Bitch Sweet Lady Overload Electrified

Although the material for Ritual's "The Ancient Tome" was recorded in the mid/late eighties, it is by far, the most easy to find of all the Ritual albums, which have become hidden gems to collectors the world over.

The album kicks off with the track "Give it to ya straight", and it instantly takes you back in time. To a time when metal wasn't about who was more extreme. Instead, Ritual took it (relatively) slow, and produced some of the most kickass music to come from the "hair" scene. "Give it to ya straight" is a classic example of pure metal attitude. The riffs are nice and crunchy (Note: CRUNCHY, not incredibly distorted) the drums are nice and clean, and the bass is thumpin'.

The entirety of "The Ancient Tome" consists of nothing but pure heavy metal madness, but of course, there are a couple of standard ballads on the album, which really add to the awesome factor of the whole thing. Tracks like "Overload" and "Friend or Foe" could very well be considered headbanging anthems, while tracks like "If I had your Love" make you want to put your lighter up in the air.

Overall, "The Ancient Tome" is definitely worthy of being up in the ranks of Motley Crue, Twisted Sister, and Poison. For their time, they were completely badass, but they never seemed to really make it. Maybe they weren't pretty enough; maybe their eyeliner was a bit too thin. Whatever the case may be, the world missed out on some incredible music.

My only qualm with this album is that the production isn't as good as it should be. It's very lo-fi and sounds a bit muffled, which to an audiophile like me is almost maddening. Other than that, "The Ancient Tome" is a great compilation from a great band.