“Go Off” is the second album from the Marty Friedman and Jason Becker project known as Cacophony, released in 1989.
The first one, “Speed Metal Symphony” was released in 1987.
It’s basically like Racer X but a bit more on the technical side of thrash, like Watchtower. And like Racer X, the guitarists in the band would go on to explore other outlets. Marty Friedman with Megadeth and Jason Becker with David Lee Roth, which was cut short by a terminal disease which took away all movement.
“X-Ray Eyes” feels like it came from a Testament album. The lead section has Becker and Friedman trading sections for over a minute and raw thrash like vocals.
“E.S.P” starts off with a finger picked intro and lead that resembles Baroque. You feel like you are in a castle watching the jester perform, before it rips into a thrash metal riff which reminds of Annihilator. Listen to the outro (the last minute), and the riffs and the harmony leads.
“Stranger” attempts to be groovy with Van Halen like riffs while “Go Off” is an instrumental, with a lot of fast guitar solos. Not my favourite cuts.
“Black Cat” has this Oriental feel in the first minute, before it moves to a Thin Lizzy style harmony merged with Gary Moore’s “Over The Hills And Far Away”. At 7 minutes long, it’s the first two minutes I like.
“Sword Of The Warrior” is another thrash-a-thon, with symphonic harmony sweeps. But when the steroid infused “Peace Sells” inspired bass riff kicks in, the song gets even faster. This track could have come from “Kill Em All” or the “Peace Sells” album.
“Floating World” is a lot slower, more rock like with Thin Lizzy harmonies. And when it’s at that level I am a fan.
“Images” is a slower tempo song, which sounds like it came from the soundtrack of an Italian Spaghetti Western. This one is an instrumental and at 3 minutes long, it’s perfect.
So if you like guitar playing with flawless technique and songs with a lot of riffs and leads and raw vocals then you should give it a listen. Or if you want to hear a great instrumental track, then just go straight to “Images”. You will not be disappointed.
destroyerofharmony 
New one for me. Heard of the band members, but not this band. Cool to see where they start.
They were better in the subsequent bands.
This band got lots of press from the guitar mags. I never got into the whole shredder deal so I read about it and that was about it.
Its a good call. While there are sections which get me interested, I still like songs and there has to be good songs for the shred to work.
I remember the album and especially its cover but probably never listened to it.
As much as I wanted it to be perfect and enjoyable it’s basically young technical hotshot guitarists unchained. I think Friedman became a better songwriter with Mustaine at the helm deciding.
I always wanted this album actually.
I do like the sound of Italian spaghetti westerns.
There’s a few tracks which start of like that and they do it well.