Category Cd Reviews

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Primal Rock Rebellion is a new band that has been formed by two well known UK musicians – Adrian Smith (Iron Maiden) and Mikee Goodman (Sikth). Their debut single was released on 6th February, and now their debut album, Awoken Broken, is available.

The music features some great guitar melodies and is slightly heavier than Iron Maiden with more of an edgy feel to it. The vocals are mainly the normal style of rock/metal singing (as opposed to screaming, growling etc), and are extremely good. I must admit to never having listened to Sikth so I can’t say if Mikee Goodmans vocals here are a similar style to his vocals with Sikth – all I can say is that they’re great here...

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”The art of metal” is the second album from Swedish all-female metal band, Hysterica. For anyone who hasnt listened to Hysterica before, these ladies don’t play gothic or symphonic metal – they play proper old school metal. Since releasing their debut album, Metalwar, Hysterica have recruited a keyboard player which does seem from listening to this new album, to enhance their sound without detracting from the traditional metal feel of the music.
The album was produced by Pontus Norgren (HAMMERFALL) and Marcus Jidell (EVERGREY).

As with the first album, the lyrics can be slightly cheesy at times, but then that’s a trait fairly common in heavy metal.

There are some great songs on the album – ”Heels of steel” and ”Fighters of the century” in particular...

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Silent Opera are an Italian band formed in 2007. They released a demo in early 2010 which was well received, and have now released their debut album – Immortal Beauty.
The musical style is symphonic metal, with powerful operatic style vocals. This will inevitably lead to comparisons with Tarja Turunen and Nightwish. The vocals are certainly very good – crystal clear, powerful, and well suited to the music.

”Always with you” stands out from the rest of the album as its one of the only tracks to use male vocals as well as the female ones. Unusually for a symphonic metal band they have opted not to use the beauty and the beast style – clean female vocals with grunts and growls from the male vocalist. Instead the male vocals are sung as well, and the track works very well.

The other trac...

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Unisonic may be a new name on the metal scene, but a lot of people will be drooling in anticipation at the thought of records and gigs from the band. The reason? Simple, it’s who makes up the band that is exciting. The band was founded by Michael Kiske (Helloween, Avantasia etc), and for the first time in 20 years, sees him working with Helloween founder Kai Hansen. The pairing of Hansen and Kiske, who worked together on what are widely regarded as Helloweens greatest albums – Keeper of the seven keys parts 1 & 2, is sure to excite fans. Making up the rest of the band are some other equally talented musicians – Mandy Meyer (Gotthard, Krokus, Asia), Dennis Ward (Pink cream 69) and Kosta Zafiriou (Pink cream 69).

This EP (or Mini album as they have described it) is just a taster before ...

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Two Wings are a band from Glasgow Born of a song-writing collaboration between singer/multi-instrumentalist/visual artist Hanna Tuulikki (Nalle, Scatter, The Family Elan) and guitarist/singer Ben Reynolds (Baby Dee, Trembling Bells, Alasdair Roberts, Tompkins Square Records), Two Wings line-up is completed by vocalist Lucy Duncombe, bassist Kenny Wilson and drummer Owen Curtis Williams. With the addition of a brass section the band have now recorded their debut album – Love’s Spring.

This is definitely a hard album to review as it’s a difficult one to categorise or describe, other than to say it’s got quite a haunting and bizarre feel to it at times. There’s folky parts, 50s rock and roll influenced bits – generally a whole mix of styles.

The female vocals are quite unusual, and even aft...

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The Albion band are one of the great British folk rock bands, alongside bands such as Steeleye Span and Fairport Convention. The band formed in 1971 and ran till 2002 with various lineup changes over the years, with founder member Ashley Hutchings being the only member to be part of the band for its entire life. In 2011 Ashley Hutchings announced that the band was to reform, but that he would no longer be a member – instead his son Blair Dunlop would be leading the band. This new line up also features a number of other current folk performers from a range of backgrounds reflecting earlier versions of the Albion Band...

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N.O.A.H. is the third album from German metallers Kadavrik. Over the last nine years they’ve been playing some good melodic death metal, doing well in Germany but not making much impact internationally. I’m not sure why they haven’t made an impact, because based on the music they certainly deserve to be much better known.

Death metal riffs with some good heavy melodies put them at the heavier end of the melodic death metal spectrum, without losing the all important melodic element.

There are some great tracks on the album – ”Let my blood boil tonight” being a particularly good one. The album is unusual in having a mix of German and English songs, but the inability to understand the lyrics on the German language songs didnt detract from the enjoyment of the songs.

A very good album for fa...

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Mortad are a London based metal band founded by Iranian Somi Arian. I first came across the band when they played at the Bloodstock festival in 2011, where they put in a seriously impressive second stage performance. Their new album is being given away free with the latest issue of Metal Hammer magazine in the UK, and to coincide with this, their EP, Pandemic Paranoia which was self released in 2011, is being re-released.
The obvious comparison for Mortad is Arch Enemy – you’ve got brutally powerful metal coupled with growling vocals from a female singer. Equally Arch Enemy are big supporters of Amnesty International while Mortad’s lyrics attack the oppression of people by religion and government, so both are looking at more intelligent topics than you get with many bands...

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OPERA DIABOLICUS is the brainchild of composer David Grimoire and lyricist Adrian de Crow. The idea sprung to life when the two of them met randomly at a stage play of Umberto Eco’s book The Name of the Rose at a theatre in Gothenburg the year 2006. Both of them were very intrigued by the story and they ended up talking about how interesting it would be to make a theatrical and dark metal musical based on that kind of a story. The conversation between them that took place in Gothenburg that bleak December night planted the seed that soon should grow to be the concept of OPERA DIABOLICUS.

For this project an impressive group of musicians has been gathered together...

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”Feet don’t fail me now” is the first single to be taken from Jake Morley’s forthcoming album ”Many fish to fry”. It’s a hard one to describe – I’d say it’s a cross between, pop and rock, but that’s not really doing it justice.

The song has a great tune, and for the backing vocals he has a choir singing them – they really add a lot to the power and richness of the song, and it does feel as though it should be from a movie soundtrack. This is a great song that just puts a smile on your face when you hear it. If the rest of the album lives up to this standard then it should be a big seller.

”Feet don’t fail me now” will be released on March 12th.