James Rivera's Metal Wave will release their debut album, New Wave Gone Metal, on July 28 via Massacre Records. Pre-order the album here, and watch a video for a cover of Tears For Fears' "Everybody Wants To Rule The World" below.
James Rivera sunk his teeth into selected songs by some of the greatest bands of the new wave/dark wave era, and turned them into something more metal.

Rivera's love for metal is undeniable, but his heart is also beating for the darker side of music, especially for new as well as dark wave and goth music - and James Rivera's Metal Wave's debut album, New Wave Gone Metal, perfectly combines the best of those genres.
The band puts its own mark on selected classics and thereby invents a new genre: Metal Wave.

Tracklisting:
Black Celebration (Depeche Mode)
Love My Way (The Psychedelic Furs)
Lovesong (The Cure)
Shock The Monkey (Peter Gabriel)
Black Planet (The Sisters Of Mercy)
Everybody Wants To Rule The World (Tears For Fears)
Bela Lugosi’s Dead (Bauhaus)
The Killing Moon (Echo & The Bunnymen)
Pet Sematary (Ramones)
Rain (The Cult)







This has to be a joke. If anyone does not have the right voice for this kind of stuff, then it's James Rivera.

Good god, that "Everybody Wants to Rule the World" cover SUCKS. Sounds sloppy, band can't keep in time with itself, and they stripped all the groove out of it. Yikes.

Can I get a towel, my ears are bleeding.

Always amazes me how stuff like that cover gets released without anyone involved putting a stop to it.

I even hate the album title. Must you be so on the nose? Why not make some creative music and have people draw the conclusion, 'huh! Sounds like Metal gone New Wave!", rather than making the album title a description of how we're supposed to think about it. I loved the last Helstar album and james sounded great, but ....this?

depeche mode cover is whatever until he starts singing and it’s just awful. but my fucking god that tears for fears cover is the worst thing i’ve heard in idk how long that wasn’t just one guy on his bedroom. literally how anyone didn’t stop this before it actually got a proper release is criminal. bouta file a class action suit on this mf for unleashing this failed ileostomy on us all

My reaction I guess isn't that extreme, it just makes me kind of sad. I mean hopefully some people out there like it, i guess. jeez.

I’ve always wanted to hear a heavy metal version of Sisters of Mercy’s When You Don’t See Me, it only because the original already sounds like a Dio song that accidentally snuck in and got recorded before anybody noticed.

Appalling. And why the silly vampire fangs? So cheesy.
(And I love Helstar, but let's cite this for what it is.)

Well at least Multiples of Black isn't the worst thing Rivera's been a part of anymore.

Instead of a new Helstar album...

I don't want to hate on it too much since it seems Rivera is genuinely trying to pay tribute to the new wave/gothic rock bands he likes and is having fun with it, but the execution leaves a lot to be desired to say the least.

Can't wait for Robert Fripp's tribute to brutal death metal

LOL. Awesome.

Ouch. I love love new wave and synth pop and goth and all that 80s goodness. This was not executed well. At all.

Small Town Boy covered by Paradise Lost. Now that’s a cool 80s metal cover.

*sigh*... When did most veteran metal musicians stop making good music, and why wasn't I informed?

Yeah, this is an outstanding track listing. At the very least, it proves he has great taste in non-metal music.
But, the dude has 'vampire' fangs. I want to fight him because of that...gotta knock some sense (of reality) in the old boy.

Must've run out of good ideas so he decided to have a crack at the bad ideas.
I wonder if he wore those stupid fangs while recording coz it fuckin sounds like he did.

Even though I grew up with both Helstar and TearsForFears I have to admit this is quite awful

Just stick a giant wooden stake in his mouth and he'll shut up.

I remember him having the fangs when I saw Helstar open for Flotsam and Jetsam five or six years ago, they were playing a mix of Nosferaru and Vampiro so it made sense in that albeit still very cheesy context. Guess they’re just an all the time thing?

I am looking forward to the contrarian review that gives this 100%.

Nothing to add about the music, but damn those teeth look uncomfortable!

This is so incredibly bad that people randomly finding it on Youtube might think it's satire.

Almost as bad as this:

His voice... really doesn't work on any of these lol. That Tears for Fears cover in particular is some serious Danzig Sings Elvis level shite.

Just... why?

Hmmm, almost leaves me speechless.
That said, I think this is what David DeFeis has been striving to achieve this past decade. LOL

Since when are The Ramones new wave?

That Tears For Fears cover really doesn't work IMO. I can imagine a band like the Night Flight Orchestra doing a faithful cover of it, and a musical project in that style would be successful, but this is just weird.

Their 80s Phil Spector stuff definitely had a new wave vibe to it.

Fun fact. Joey was a massive fan of Kraftwerk.

This sounds like garbage but I'm curious on what their Black Planet cover will sound like.

Goth metal bands like Paradise Lost or Moonspell beat them to it. Like 20 years ago. And it didn't sound as forced.

and those bands weren't even good 20 years ago.