''Borrowed Time'' is the second studio album by British heavy metal band Diamond Head. It was recorded in 1981 and released in 1982, reaching Number 24 on the

UK Albums Chart The Official Albums Chart is the United Kingdom's industry-recognised national record chart for album, albums. Entries are ranked by sales and audio streaming. It was published for the first time on 22 July 1956 and is compiled every week by the O ...

. In a 2008 interview, guitarist Brian Tatler said that this was his favourite period with Diamond Head and that the band "seemed to be getting somewhere after six years of building".

Background

This was the band's first major label released after being signed to

MCA Records MCA Records was an American record label owned by MCA Inc. established in 1972, though MCA had released recordings under that name in the UK from the 1960s. The label achieved success in the 1970s through the 1980s, often by acquiring other ...

in 1981. As this was their first album under a major label, the album was much cleaner and better produced. However, some say that MCA was the wrong label for Diamond Head, which is one of the contributions to their downfall. Some have also questioned the necessity for "

Am I Evil? "Am I Evil?" is a song by British heavy metal band Diamond Head. Released on the band's 1980 debut album ''Lightning to the Nations'', it remains the band's signature song''.'' The song was written by lead vocalist Sean Harris and guitarist ...

" and "Lightning to the Nations" to be included on the album, since they had already appeared on the band's debut album, ''

Lightning to the Nations ''Lightning to the Nations'' (also known as ''The White Album'') is the debut album by British heavy metal band Diamond Head. The album was recorded in 1980 (after the 1977 and 1979 demos) and released later that year through Happy Face Reco ...

''. The reason for this was that their first album was only meant as a demo with the idea of ''Borrowed Time'' being their first official album. However, things have not quite worked out that way, with the former becoming their most notable work to date. Originally, ''Borrowed Time'' was only released on CD in Japan, making it a highly collectible item. Although on 15 October 2008, it was released by

Metal Mind Productions Metal Mind Productions (MMP) is a Polish record label founded in 1987. The label focuses on rock and heavy metal. MMP is also publisher of ''Metal Hammer'', the largest and the oldest heavy metal magazine. As a concert agency, it organises Meta ...

on CD format, with bonus tracks. However, this was limited to 2,000 copies. The release contains

B-side The A-side and B-side are the two sides of phonograph record, vinyl records and Compact cassette, cassettes, and the terms have often been printed on the labels of two-sided music recordings. The A-side of a Single (music), single usually ...

s, such as "Dead Reckoning", which were previously unavailable on CD. However,

Geffen Records Geffen Records (formerly The David Geffen Company from 1980 to 1992 and Geffen Records Inc. from 1993 to 2004) is an American record label, founded in late 1980 by David Geffen. Originally a music subsidiary of the company known as Geffen Pi ...

have now issued the album on general release. The cover features a lavish

Rodney Matthews Rodney Matthews (born 6 July 1945) is a British illustrator and conceptual designer of fantasy and science-fiction. Career Trained at the West of England College of Art, Matthews worked in advertising for Plastic Dog Graphics before turning ...

illustrated gatefold sleeve, based on the album's

Elric of Melniboné Elric of Melniboné is a fictional character created by English writer Michael Moorcock and the protagonist of a series of sword and sorcery stories taking place on an alternative Earth. The proper name and title of the character are Elric VI ...

theme, which was the most expensive sleeve commissioned by MCA at that time.

Musical style

This album saw the band move away from all-out heavy

riff A riff is a short, repeated motif or figure in the melody or accompaniment of a musical composition. Riffs are most often found in rock music, punk, heavy metal music, Latin, funk, and jazz, although classical music is also sometimes based ...

s and towards softer and more progressive songs, such as "In the Heat of the Night" and "Don't You Ever Leave Me", which was well-received by fans, as the former has remained a regular in the live set list to date.

Reception

The album managed to get to No. 24 in the UK album charts, becoming the band's first and only album to chart. The band went on to perform a full scale UK arena tour, performing large venues such as London's

Hammersmith Apollo The Hammersmith Apollo, currently called the Eventim Apollo for sponsorship reasons, and formerly and still commonly known as the Hammersmith Odeon, is a live entertainment performance venue, originally built as a cinema called the Gaumont Pa ...

. The album failed to live up to prior expectations as the band's more commercial take to their music turned out to be a disappointment to critics.

Track listing

Personnel

Per the liner notes *Sean Harris – vocals, backing vocals, percussion,

vocoder A vocoder (, a portmanteau of ''vo''ice and en''coder'') is a category of speech coding that analyzes and synthesizes the human voice signal for audio data compression, multiplexing, voice encryption or voice transformation. The vocoder wa ...

*Brian Tatler – guitars, backing vocals *Colin Kimberley – bass, Taurus bass pedals, backing vocals *Duncan Scott – drums, percussion

Charts

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Borrowed Time (Album) Diamond Head (band) albums MCA Records albums 1982 albums Albums produced by Mike Hedges Albums with cover art by Rodney Matthews