Exactly, he sounds goofy, and really sounds like a try hard. Watching more of the Wacken performance last night, I'm still amazed at how good Ripper fitted with the bands sound, and especially on the old material, he just made it work really well. Him trying to sound like Barlow would have been a train wreck, and I don't understand why Ripper was Ripper but Stu has to be like Barlow.
I just laugh back at the whole Ripper era. Jon was all like "Ripper is the voice I've been hearing all along with Iced Earth music." "Holy fuck." I thought. Then they released the Reckoning, and it was like "Shit, this isn't Barlow but it pretty fucking good." The two album Ripper did were really good and for the band to come back after losing Barlow like that was incredible and props to Tim.
Then Jon comes out with "I've spoken to the fans and they all want Barlow back." Really Jon, I never recieved your phone call. I would have gladly told you otherwise. Since that point Iced Earth has become redundant IMO, and that move has blown up in Jon's face, and Stu isn't putting this band back at where they were in 2004/2005.
I agree Ripper was a pretty damn good fit but I didn't like the Something Wicked albums at all. That is why the fan interest was lessening, IMO...not because of Ripper.
Ripper never had very good stage presence and right from the start Ripper wasn't too impressed with Jon Schaeffer's attitude. Right off the bat, Jon was being defensive of being the only consistent band member and that he had written all the music and lyrics. He kept saying that Ripper wasn't a songwriter. Well, Glorious Burden was recorded with Ripper coming in at the last minute so he only had time to write lyrics for one song. Jon offered him the other Barlow songs but Ripper said that was too much in too short of a time. Then Something Wicked came and that was all Schaeffer's thing so again, Ripper didn't have anything to add and Jon used the excuse that Ripper isn't a writer.
Pretty shitty. Barlow came back and I bought the album they did but it really didn't do anything for me and I thought...."Holy crap, I might be done with IE"
Then Barlow left and I was like, "Well....yeah, thats all I needed was one last reason to not give a crap."
For the record I actually like Sons of Liberty for the MUSIC....the lyrics were dumb and paranoid but I could look past it because I really dug the music.
Then again, I got it as a free download and when he released the second one I was like, "Meh....don't wanna spend the cash to support a weird conspiracy theory"