What with the world and his wife going off to war at the moment, it couldn’t be more appropriate a time to discover that Tank, the trailblazing NWOBHM band formed by gravel-throated bassist and cider enthusiast Algy Ward in 1980, is roaring back into battle with a new album entitled Sturmpanzer.
“I just got an updated from Algy Ward of Tank,” said an announcement posted on Facebook by the webmaster of the official Tank fansite, TankFilthhounds.net. “Algy is back in the studio to record long awaited album Sturmpanzer. There are about 11 songs. I will post track listing later on! Algy said thanks to all for your support HAMMER ON!”
And, good to his word, the tracklisting appeared on the web in due course:
1. Sturmpanzer(Parts 1& 2);
2. March;
3. No More War;
4. Erwin Rommel(fur Reich und Fatherland);
5. Lianne’s Crying;
6. Living in Fear Of God;
7. Which Part of Fuck Off don’t You understand;
8. Two Thousand Miles Away;
9. Revenge of the Filth Hounds(Part 1 & 2);
10. First They Killed Her Father;
11. The Last Soldier.
Mixed & produced by Algy Ward & Guy Denning.
Mastered by Tim Turan @ Turan Audio.
Sturmpanzer is an album title well known to hardcore Tank fans as the never-recorded follow-up to 2002’s Still At War, which was the last album Algy played on for more than a decade. Indeed, Algy was forced to re-take control of Tank last year after two of his erstwhile bandmates, guitarists Mick Tucker and Cliff Evans, stole the name out from under him and made some ready cash by touring and releasing a couple of albums of low-calorie power metal as ‘Tank’ between 2010 and 2012.
Stampeding back into action, Ward hit back with a solo comeback record, 2013’s Breath of the Pit, a snarling drum-machine led album that revealed he’d far from mellowed with age. (And boasted a track dedicated to Evans and Tucker, sensitively entitled ‘Crawl Back Into Your Hole’.)
Sturmpanzer is scheduled to be released in 2015 and Algy will perform bass, drums, guitar and vocals on the album, as he did on Breath Of The Pit.
