NWOBHM was a musical movement that reignited Metal rebirth throughout the world. These words are nothing that hasn't been said before countless times. But one thing stands, even after all these years: that there are bands of those days that never released an album. And it's nothing hard to find some recollections of material being released today, an archeological work that deserves applauses, because it's nothing easy to research such thing. And one of these unknown names of those days is WIKKYD VIKKER, from Leicester, Leicestershire (England), and "Black of the Night" tries to correct the historical injustice the band suffered.

They play a form of NWOBHM Heavy Metal model: the traditional mix between melodies and aggressiveness with 70's Hard Rock elements, with a heavy load of JUDAS PRIEST and THIN LIZZY influences, but sharpened by the band's musical personality. And the band's music shows a melodic appeal that could be a commercial success (near of what DEF LEPPARD was during "On Through the Night" and "High 'n' Dry" days, and to the same ways tracked down by TOKYO BLADE), because their melodies are accessible, easy to understand, and everything is really very good. A band that could not be brilliant, but that deserved a chance. The sonority heard on "Black of the Night" is really good for those days and even today), organic and heavy, clean enough for the band to express their musical ideas (only a fix could be done in the instrumental tunes, and on the vocals as well, but nothing so problematic to make things a loss of time). It's good, but their music deserved something better.

The band's musical ideas expressed on the songs are all very good, even being from different releases. So be seduced by songs as "Black of the Night" "and "Stonehenge" (Ebony Version) (very good chorus and great guitars on both songs), "Take It from Me" and "Super Rokker" (both mixing the aggressive Heavy Metal sound of the NWOBHM with excellent accessible melodies), the long ballad "Phoenix" (this song could be shorter, because 7 minutes to a ballad would be a problem to be played on the radio), "Stonehenge (Demo version)" (a rawer version of the same song, with a boost on energy and weight, but with a not so good definition); "Release", "Rock Sure" and "On the Streets" keep the band's musical way of playing in a very good performance, and the live shot for "Wild Child" shows how they were pretty good on playing to the public, having and giving fun to everyone on the venue.

Unfortunately, "Black of the Night: The Ultimate Anthology" is the only record that witness that WIKKYD VIKKER existed. Thank you, guys.