Symphonic Power Metal band Serenity is back with a new album, Lionheart (Napalm), and they are strong as ever. As on previous album Codex Atlanticus, which explored the life and writings of Leonardo DaVinci, the band’s passion for history inspired the themes and lyrics of the album. Continue reading
Tickets went on sale today for the biggest metal party of 2018! 70000 Tons Of Metal, “The World’s Biggest Heavy Metal Cruise”, released their tickets to the public today. The cruise takes place February 1-5, 2018 voyage and sails from Miami / Fort Lauderdale to Grand Turk, Turks and Caicos Islands and back.Continue reading
Credit where credit is due. It’s not often that genuine contenders rear their heads once their career is already up and running… the anointed have usually been identified and lauded from early whether in sports, art, music, whatever, it is rare for a band to be established and then to suddenly stick their head above the parapet seemingly as if from out of nowhere as one of the best there is. With Gunmen (AFM), though, Orden Ogan have done just that, the Germans producing one of this years’ best Power/Heavy Metal offerings.Continue reading
70000 Tons of Metal Cruise 2015, by MasterPhelps Photography
Over the July 4th holiday, the annual 70000k Of Metal™ Cruise announced the first 16 of their 60 bands for their 8th edition rolling out to sea, in just under 7 months, next February. Among the bands announced are Meshuggah, Sepultura, Enslaved, Cannibal Corpse, Goatwhore, Dark Tranquility, Septicflesh and more. The full list of the 14 can be seen below:Continue reading
After 5 years, Greek Power Metal machine Firewind is back with a new album, Immortals (Century Media). In that time guitarist Gus G has been touring with Ozzy Osbourne, and the band has gone through another line-up change, with Henning Basse now admirably fulfilling the role of vocalist.Continue reading
Nightwish has been positively killing it in 2015. With their recent album Endless Forms Most Beautiful (Sony/Nuclear Blast), the band continues to bring their immaculate stage show to their global fan base. Following a sold-out US tour, Nightwish has been touring Europe this summer and nested back home for a massive show last weekend at Ratinan Stadium, in Tampere, FI. Holding upwards of 32,000 people, with a huge crowded soccer stadium, Nightwish’s evocative symphonic-influenced metal is a transcendent experience for the fan. The band took full advantage for their theatrical talents on this night, as if they play in this type of venue every day. Maybe they should! They were joined for this special occasion by their countrymen Children of Bodom and Sonata Arctica, for a tremendous bill. Captured here for Ghost Cult by Pekka Konttinen Photography, you can see what you are missing out on if you don’t live in Europe.
Nightwish, by Pekka Konttinen Photography
Nightwish, by Pekka Konttinen Photography
Nightwish, by Pekka Konttinen Photography
Nightwish, by Pekka Konttinen Photography
Nightwish, by Pekka Konttinen Photography
Crowd at Ratinan Stadium, by Pekka Konttinen Photography
Children of Bodom, by Pekka Konttinen Photography
Children of Bodom, by Pekka Konttinen Photography
Sonata Arctica, by Pekka Konttinen Photography
Sonata Arctica, by Pekka Konttinen Photography
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With the EP Fire & Ashes (Napalm), German Symphonic Metal band Xandria releases their second work to feature vocalist Dianne van Giersbergen.
Only the first three songs on the EP are new and original works. Opening number ‘Voyage of the Fallen’ is impressive with its use of orchestra and choir, but it lacks features that set it apart from other symphonic bands. In fact, it sounds like After Forever, Epica, and Nightwish rolled into one. ‘Unembraced’, however, has a much more unique feel with some guitar riffs and synths that feel more like NDH (Neue Deutsche Härte). This is new and interesting, and is something they should pursue if they want to really stand out from the crowd as the prospect of more high operatic vocals over NDH is very exciting. The final original song, ‘In Remembrance’, is very pure and small, and coupled with the theme and classical style this brings to mind ‘When I am Laid in Earth’ from the opera Dido and Aeneas.
The EP also features two re-releases of old songs, namely Ravenheart, previously on Ravenheart and ‘Now & Forever’, previously on India (both Drakkar). They are both good songs, but neither have enough individuality to really set them apart from other Symphonic Metal bands.
Then there are the two covers. One is Meatloaf’s ‘I Would Do Anything For Love (But I Won’t Do That)’, and that actually works really well once they really immerse it in their own style. The other shows a serious lack of judgement, because it is Sonata Arctica’s ‘Don’t Say A Word’. Since this is the same genre of music, everything but the vocals is identical to the original. And the operatic vocals miss the sting that Tony Kakko gives to a line like “Open your blue eyes, tell me that you love me, whore!” Only the bridge is done in a very original manner. This would have been great as a live performance, because Xandria fans are bound to know Sonata Arctica, but it doesn’t have enough that’s recognisably Xandria – or at least, that’s not Sonata – in it to earn its place on an album.
With only three new songs, two old songs, and two covers, it is not clear to me why the band actually made this EP. The new material is good, and has a little more individuality than the older material, but it would be much better suited to an album of its own.
6.5/10
LORRAINE LYSEN
Well, that’s shut me well and truly the fuck up
(You wish…)
It’s apt to begin a commentary on a release from one ex-Helloween guitarist (Roland Grapow) with reference to the man he succeeded in the pumpkin-obsessed kings of Power Metal, one Kai Hansen, who titled the third Gamma Ray album Insanity & Genius (Noise) and referenced in the lyrics how thin the line between the two is. Well, the line between generic and uninteresting pap and Power Metal Glory is even thinner, perhaps as thin as the hair-line on Herr Hansen’s fivehead these days. But with As Daylight Breaks (Nuclear Blast) Serious Black (contenders for best new band name – certainly best Harry Potter themed one) have released a debut that is so far over the line on the side of quality, the line is a dot to them (answers on a postcard if you get that reference).
Having written off Power Metal in my mind as a genre that, no matter how well its composite parts could be put together, was done, creatively redundant and in the type of artistic morass that Death Metal found itself in for twenty years, nevertheless, like the child poking the disembowelled frog with a stick and hoping for some twitch or reaction, with morbid curiosity I find myself drawn to it. See, when Power Metal is on it, there’s very little better for invigorating the mind and soul. And Grapow’s latest offering slapped me round the chops, leaving me with a fiendish grin, a rediscovered enthusiasm for the genre and a frog named Lazarus.
The brainchild of Grapow and former Visions of Atlantis bassist Mario Lochert, with the rhythm section rounded out by former Blind Guardian tub thumper Thomen Stauch, Serious Black absolutely nail everything that is joyous about Power Metal infused hard rock, from the driving opening pair of ‘I Seek No Other Life’ and the simply massive ‘High And Low’ through to the theatre-y and slightly camp closing ‘Older and Wiser’.
The band is led by the underrated and under-celebrated vocal talents of former Tad Morose pipes, Urban breed who avoids being one of a million Kiske-clean wannabes by injecting power and tone; at times channelling Jon Oliva, particularly on the keys led title-track, at others Mike Howe (Metal Church), and able to carry a faster verse alongside the ubiquitous sizeable choruses.
Musically, you can bandy about names such as Kamelot (‘Akhenation’), Within Temptation (the uptempo rock romp of ‘Trail of Murder’), Savatage, Stratovarius, and Sonata Arctica if you like; there definite elements of Blind Guardian and Helloween, and that’s absolutely fine, as Serious Black sit as a kind of summation of all that “is” from the polished end of Power Metal.
As Daylight Breaks benefits from a great, full, vibrant production and above all exudes the sensation of a band really enjoying their work. As they rightly should. I once incorrectly tagged Grapow as a Janick Gers figure who had ruined one of my favourite bands. He well and truly proved me wrong – I even quite like Pink Bubbles Go Ape now, and I’m one of the few people on the planet who love Chameleon (both EMI) – and with Serious Black he’s done it again, proving as Edguy did with last years’ Space Police (Nuclear Blast) that, when done well, Power Metal can be fulfilling rompy-pompy.
7.5/10
STEVE TOVEY
Perhaps it says all you need to know about German Power Metallers Orden Ogan‘s fifth outing, Ravenhead (AFM/Nuclear Blast), that not only did I assume on first listen it was a debut release, but that I hadn’t realised I’d actually seen the band live a couple of years back when they were completely overshadowed by both Freedom Call and especially Luca Turilli’s Rhapsody until reminded by our fellow scribe Richie HR (who had to endure me drunkenly bellowing the wrong words in his ear all through the headline set).
See, if by your fifth album the endearing features are “promising for the future”, “naïve energy and charm” and if you don’t have a distinctive sound of your own so as to be so unremarkable as to not be remembered, then NINETEEN YEARS into your bands’ existence maybe it’s time to sit down and take stock.
But does knowing that this is a fifth album (I tend to do my research after a first listen, if research is required, so that initial impressions are as untainted as possible) make the difference in how Ravenhead should be judged? Damn skippy it does. Because you know that “promise for the future” then becomes “Oh, this is probably as good as it’s going to get” and, if we’re being honest, “naivety” really means not quite doing it right or not yet realising what needs to be done to live up to the masters (or indeed apeing the masters a touch too much to be a successful band in your own right). Having lived with Ravenhead for a while it becomes obvious that, like so much else in today’s consumer society, while superficially it’s all shiny and nice, as an album it lacks any real depth, substance or character.
Borrowing heavily from Blind Guardian and their school of fantasy-tinged Power Metal, this is exemplarily well played, but as a million death/metalcore bands show, technical expertise certainly doesn’t equate to innovative songwriting ability and Orden Ogan will always be so far in the shadows of their countrymen that they may as well be invisible.
There are decent tracks on here, but after two decades and five albums I want more than a band that sounds a lot like one of their contemporaries with a touch of Sonata Arctica (on ‘A Reason To Give’) or an added folky, shanty feel to a ‘At The End Of The World’. Meanwhile ‘Deaf Among The Blind’ may as well add the word Guardian to the title and serve to sum up Orden Ogan’s status in life. Some of this may seem harsh because this is a perfectly pleasant proficient and professional Power Metal product, but where there is wheat, all else must be termed chaff.
6.0 / 10
STEVE TOVEY
