Voodoo Highway

Plenty of great music slips off the radar, and Badlands is among the greatest crimes of overlookage in the hard rock lexicon. Combining intelligence, chops, a reverence for "roots" music (true blues homage is all over the place here, just like with early Zeppelin) with modern metal sensibilities produces a shimmering rock experience in the form of Voodoo Highway. While Jake E. Lee was never really excepted by many Ozzy fans because he had to follow Randy Rhoads, he has done excellent on his own. He has his own distinctive way of playing and the guitars on here are raw and scorching. With Ray Gillen singing, these guys fit like a glove together.

Badlands

Features former Ozzy Osbourne's guitarist Jake E. Lee and Black Sabbath's vocalist Ray Gillen. Badlands' self-titled debut featured a refreshingly stripped-down blues metal sound, which cut against the grain of the polished pop metal then in vogue. Exploding with Lee's impressive chops and Gillen's powerful Robert Plant-like screams, opener "High Wire" sets the energetic tone, and leads the way to other outstanding melodic rockers like "Dreams in the Dark" and "Winter's Call" -- both of which received generous MTV rotation. In retrospect, the album's enduring relevance places it not alongside glam metal groups like Motley Crue or Ratt, but in the better company of other retro-minded hard rock bands such as the Black Crowes