Viper Queen release Munich City Nights on 13 November through Pride and Joy Music, seven years after the Munich band formed and six after their only EP.
Nine songs, and the tracklist is unusually honest about where they come from. Dealing With Fire, Call of the Viper, Black Thunder and Lifetime Rebel all carry the tag 2026 version, which means nearly half the record is material the band already had out as singles or on the 2020 EP Surrender to the Bite, cut again for the album.
There is a sensible reason for it. A band that spends six years releasing one song at a time ends up with a catalogue nobody can buy in one place, and a debut that gathers it is more useful to a new listener than a debut that ignores it. The cost is that only five of the nine songs are genuinely new.
Undercover Lover opens the record and is the first piece the label has put out from it. The sound is the Munich end of heavy metal that keeps one foot in hard rock, the title track named after the city the band come from.