by Eduardo Rivadavia
Ten Years in Rage is a collection of unreleased tracks spanning the first decade of Rage's hit-and-miss career, most of them reworked and re-recorded specifically for release here. Over the course of 15 tracks (five of them added in 2002 when Noise/Sanctuary remastered, repackaged, and reissued all of Rage's early catalog), the German also-rans rip through equal doses of adrenalin-fueled thrashers ("Vertigo," "She Killed and Smiled," "Dangerous Heritage," etc.) and melodic metal anthems ("Destination Day," "No Sign of Life," etc.) with their reliable mix of conviction and underwhelming results. No matter, however, for, like any guilty pleasure, Rage are simply concerned with pleasing their steadfast fans at this stage of the game. For those rabid followers, this release (and especially the medley of old riffs and song fragments entitled "The Blow in a Row") will probably fulfill its purpose in spades, but casual fans just looking for a best-of set are urged to seek out 1998's more representative The Best From the Noise Years.