Wolfsbane - Genius

Jun 5

2 min read

Updated: 2 days ago

On June 5, 2022 "Wolfsbane" released their 5th album "Genius".

Blaze Bayley's mother band returns with their first studio album in a decade, after "Wolfsbane Save the World", which came out in 2012. "Genius" came out independently, and the cover was designed by Simon "Mackie" Piasecki, who also designed the covers of the 1990 EP "All Hell's Breaking Loose Down At Little Kathy Wilson's Place" and the 1991 album "Down Fall The Good Guys".

As you may recall, Blaze Bayley, known from "Iron Maiden" (he sang on "The X Factor" and "Virtual XI"), began his musical career back in 1984, when he joined "Wolfsbane", a band from Tamworth, England. The band's first album - "Live Fast, Die Fast" - was produced by Rick Rubin and released on his Def American label in 1989 (Wolfsbane were the first English band the label signed), and since then Bayley has participated in three more of the band's studio albums. The band, whose fans call themselves the "Howling Mad Shitheads" (HMS for short), split in 1994 when Bayley joined "Iron Maiden", and got back together in 2011.

Interestingly, since its inception, "Wolfsbane" has retained its original line-up, which beyond Blaze Bayley includes guitarist Jason Edwards, bassist Jeff Hateley and drummer Steve Danger. In November 2025 it released "Live Faster", a full re-recording of the debut album produced by Jase Edwards, and in May 2026 it put out a new song, "Touch You There", alongside a UK tour marking 40 years of the unchanged line-up.

The songs on "Genius" move mostly in the comfort zone of "Hard Rock" with light touches of punk and metal.

We loved the combination of speed metal and punk in the opening song "Spit It Out", and the hard rock of "Impossible Love" which at moments sounds like a combination of "Bon Jovi" and "Van Halen" of the David Lee Roth era, and the punk-pop in the chorus of "Zombies" and "Good Time". Another example: "Zombies" opens with a cheap synth straight out of a late-night sci-fi b-movie, and "Good Time" comes with glam-rock handclaps.