December 17, 2025 Uncategorized Post a Comment

The Metal Pigeon’s Best of 2025 // Part One: The Songs

I think I look forward to deciding and narrowing down my best songs of the year lists as much if not more so than my albums lists, mainly because the songs list is always a little off balance, a little quirky and perhaps even inexplicable. Sometimes songs will just stick with you no matter how much you’ve tried to shake them due to overconsumption, or you’ll realize that your nominee for best song of the year isn’t necessarily the best representative song on a given album, or better yet, your favorite song off an album will be loathed by many! I nailed all of those categories with this year’s Best Songs, and also as an added bonus I found this incredibly easier to put together than this year’s albums list which is the tightest race I’ve come across in ages for the top spot. Going to keep this preamble shorter than usual, only to add that if covers were allowed on the Best Songs list, The Halo Effect might’ve had two entries here with their renditions of Danzig’s “How the Gods Kill” and Broder Daniel’s “Shoreline”, they were just that damn good. Anyway, the list!

10.   Majestica– “Go Higher” (from the album Power Train)

Effortless, classic Europower with the Scandinavian gloss of Stratovarius and the gritty, galloping riffs of Gamma Ray and pre-Hellfire Club Edguy, Majestica outpaced most power metal artists this year with their Power Train album, and in particular, its standout album deep cut “Go Higher”. Seemingly overlooked while most of the general fan attention was directed at the title track and “No Pain, No Gain”, I thought this song should’ve been a single. Maybe its that Tommy Johannsson’s vocals here remind me of Timo Kotipelto circa Visions or Destiny era Strato, replete with a noticeable English as a second language accent thing happening which sounds so fitting and perfect for this style of power metal (the Sonata Arctica call and response backing vocal lines are also a chefs kiss). And lets not bury the lede here, part of this songs awesomeness lies in its lyrical theme, of a version of Back to the Future where our hero ends up in 1995 instead of 1955 (or 2015 for that matter). Johannsson’s gloriously triumphant delivery of the line “Hearing one man’s voice saying loud in the night, “I’m your density. I mean destiny.”” is a contender for lyric of the year. I’d like to think in this song our protagonist somehow got handed a copy of Land of the Free and decided to stick around for the late 90s power metal explosion that was soon to follow. Marty McFly would be proud.

9.   Brainstorm – “Garuda (Eater of Snakes)“ (from the album Plague of Rats)

Riding high on a late career bloom, Brainstorm are making their second consecutive appearance on the Best Songs list, having landed here in 2021 with the anthemic “Glory Disappears” off Wall of Skulls. That song was classic Andy B. Franck, an arms wide expansive bellow-worthy chorus that his muscular vocal delivered with satisfying aplomb, a reminder of just how incredible (and overlooked) he is within the world of power metal. This time however, Franck takes a bit of a backseat to the machinations of his fellow bandmates, particularly guitarists Torsten Ihlenfeld and Milan Loncaric, who deliver a Teutonic slab of concrete riffs, sounding like equal parts Accept and Kreator and making this more of a band centric effort. Franck’s brilliance shines through however with some clever vocal melody design in the delayed effect he employs on the chorus by waiting a half second before delivering “…Garuda!”. It wasn’t lost on many of us longtime fans that this song was a knowing nod to the band’s past via the inclusion of east Asian melodicism, insinuating that it was a close spiritual cousin to Brainstorm classic “Shivas Tears” from Soul Temptation, making this a headbangin’ full circle moment for everyone.

8.   Vintersorg – “Efter Dis Kommer Dimma” (from the album Vattenkrafternas Spel)

Even though Vintersorg’s first album in eight years was highly anticipated by yours truly, I was still turned ecstatic by the flood of nostalgia soaked dopamine this opening salvo filled me with upon first listen. Characterized by the trademark “ooohs” Vintersorg used to dish out like Halloween ear candy during the old Otyg days, this brilliant track brought me back to the comforting warmth of Cosmic Genesis era Vintersorg, just before the progressive metal overwhelmed his sound for the next many years and albums. This wasn’t an unexpected return, after all Vintersorg’s last album in 2017 was the sequel to Till fjälls, which saw him reincorporate more of his folk influences into his modern Vintersorg mix, but “Efter Dis Kommer Dimma” is a return to that sweet spot crossroads of folk melodicism meeting progressive songwriting as only Vintersorg can navigate. This is inarguably the catchiest song the man has written in well over a decade, and yet its still very strange and weird. The keyboard lines deliberately run contrary to the entire thrust of the rest of the song, and often the percussion seems to accelerate just a beat ahead of the riffs in what feels like a purposeful disruption of anything getting close to a standard song structure, but damn it all if that’s not the best hook he’s ever penned in the chorus. The lush layered harmony vocals from Wytch’s Johanna Lundberg are the whipped cream on the espresso in this folk metal doppio con panna.

7.   Avantasia – “The Witch“ (from the album Here Be Dragons)

This was a happy surprise, not because an Avantasia song made the year end list (it would be a disappointment if one hadn’t), but because the Tobias Sammet songs that usually make and top these kind of lists are the syrupy ballads such as “Alone in Myself”, or the cinematic epics, the pomp and grandiosity of a “Ghost in the Moon” or the breathtaking sweep of a “Restless Heart and Obsidian Skies”. But the best song on Here Be Dragons instead turned out to be its most propulsive rocker, “The Witch”, a Tommy Karevik co-lead vocal empowering this sleek chorus with his smooth yet muscular delivery. It was also a delight to hear him open the song by himself, making a break from the usual method Tobias employs where he’s the first one at bat and the guest follows up (its not a coincidence that “Bring on the Night” with Bob Catley singing vocals out of the gate was another stellar song on the album). The centering of Karevik gives this song a freshness that Avantasia deeply needs more of across its recent albums, and that’s nothing against Tobias himself who turns in his usual excellent performance here, but he plays more of a supporting role, and the result made this song pop upon every listen thru the album.

6.   Messa – “At Races“ (from the album The Spin)

One of the strangest entries onto any Best Songs list in the history of this blog, Italy’s doomsters Messa gnawed their way into my brain this year with tunes as mystifying and alluring as the fantastic “At Races”. I say they’re doom, but you’d be forgiven for questioning that description if you’re hearing them for the first time via clicking the YouTube link above. Their sound is a blending of so many different elements that its hard to parse them out individually, but one thing I know for certain is that I loved how Sara Bianchin’s vocals make her sound like Elizabeth Fraser’s younger goth sister, her airy, monotoned approach lending her style a detached attitude. She balances this with a little splash of Siouxsie Sioux, her vocal melodies firmly locked onto the tempo when it counts the most, as on the opening verses during the most riff centric sequences. Her bandmates paint with a sonic palette that is deep black and soft purples, at times pulling from these obvious non-metal influences but then keeping things grounded with the rhythmic attack of Dreamtime and Love era The Cult. As I indicated above, this song is by no means representative of the more metallic side of their attack that they unleash on other tracks, but its the track that made me sit up and really take notice that I was listening to something new and fresh.

5.   Novembers Doom– “Major Arcana“ (from the album Major Arcana)

The opening eponymous track on Novembers Doom blistering new opus Major Arcana, this masterpiece not only features a wide array of brilliant vocal stylings from singer Paul Kuhr, but is also one of the most satisfyingly catchy yet brutal slabs of aggression that any band has delivered this year. The refrain here is way more complex than first listen would suggest, considering that Kuhr switches up his dynamic vocal approach on a dime from line to line from blackened death growls to his characteristic baritone bellow. Often he crosses textures, his growls surfacing underneath his clean vocals, almost distorting them in what results in a convincingly chilling utterance of pure rage. Guitarists Larry Roberts and Vito Marchese lay down the wood with punishingly heavy riffage, particularly during the buildup to the chorus where they collide with drummer Garry Naples’ in a particularly devastating passage, Naples’ percussion throughout this song just a nonstop assault of energetic, creative fills that ratchet up the intensity. This was a statement song for one of the most compelling albums released this year.

4.   Månegarm– “En nidings dåd“ (from the album Edsvuren)

Manegarm finds itself landing on the best songs list for the second time with the remarkable “En nidings dåd”, one of those transcendent songs that halts your million thoughts a second anxiety brain and forces you to lock in on its bittersweet splendor. Their first time on this list was in 2022 for the gorgeous ballad “En snara av guld”, and though that song shares similarities with this one in it’s anchoring, mournful violin melody, “En nidings dåd” stands in sharp contrast as being one of the heavier and bleaker songs on Edsvuren. The best moment comes at the 2:50 mark when a layered clean vocals usher in a bridge that packs an emotional whollop, with an uncharacteristically hard rock styled guitar solo serving as the exclamation point a minute later, the contrast reminding me of a sunrise over the frigid December Scandinavian wilderness. This song captured my attention during my first pass through this album and although it vied for the title of the best song on the album with the ballad duet “Rodhins hav”, its dynamism and brutal yet beautiful dichotomy has earned its placing as one of the best songs of the year.

3.   Helloween – “A Little Is A Little Too Much“ (from the album Giants & Monsters)

I was a little surprised at the mixed reactions this single from Helloween’s newest album got upon its initial release, when to my ears anyway, its a classic Andi Deris penned Helloween single in the vein of so many of his songs from his time as the singular frontman of the band. Its uber hooky poppiness is a trademark of so many of his songwriting contributions to the band that I can’t understand why anyone would be caught off guard by that (if that’s the complaint), or was it that the lyrics here are a little too quirky and tongue-in-cheek (hmm…as opposed to other Deris singles such as “Lost In America” or “Are You Metal?” or even going back to the old days of Better Than Raw with “Hey Lord!”…my point exactly). I simply loved this song from first listen, and its still my favorite tune off a really strong album, and it leans into Deris’ strengths as a songwriter, that being a knack for memorable vocal melodies, nifty syllabic word play, and a hard rockin’ strut during the verses that hint of old Pink Cream 69. Easily one of my favorite Helloween songs of the last twenty years, I also loved that the band chose an old school approach to the music video with actual sets, props, and a silly “plot” that felt like it could’ve actually been on MTV back in the day (as opposed to the green screen, performance based, drone shot dreck music vids that get cobbled together in droves in recent years). In this case, a little effort wasn’t too much at all, but exactly what was needed.

2.   Ancient Bards – “Unending“ (from the album Artifex)

Longtime readers of the blog will already know of my unabashed love for power metal balladry (a primer for those of you who didn’t), and Italy’s Ancient Bards had already earned their place among the genre’s most gifted at this particular craft despite having a relatively short discography. If you’ll recall, their beautiful, dazzling, Disney-esque power ballad “Light” off 2019’s Origine landed at fourth place on that year’s best songs list, and I thought that it was unlikely that the band would ever top that ballad-wise. Stunningly then, they have managed to do just that with the stately, somber toned yet light on it’s feet “Unending”, a song that sees the band marrying the darker mood of “In My Arms” with the shimmering positivity of “Light” into a masterpiece of sweet ache and grateful melancholy. Keyboardist and main songwriter Daniele Mazza has a gift for crafting melodies that unfold with slow, patient subtlety and blossom into something greater than the sum of its parts — the cinematic nature of this song feels natural, inevitable. Of course, its artistry is woven together through Sara Squadrani’s soulful, inimitable vocals, someone who I would gladly listen to singing the phone book. Together her and Mazza are making a legitimate case for being power metal’s best current ballad writing duo, and I hope for our sake they never stop.

1.   Blackbraid – “Wardrums at Dawn on the Day of my Death“ (from the album Blackbraid III)

As unlikely as it is to believe, this isn’t the first time that a black metal band has topped my best songs list, with Satyricon doing so in 2017 with the brilliant but strange “To Your Brethren In The Dark” — but it is the first time that a song which is so unrepentantly black metal in spirit, sound, and identity has sat upon this particular throne. To deny this song this placement would be to ignore its powerful magnetic pull it had as the album opener for Blackbraid’s astonishing third album (we’re obviously not calling an intro track an “opener” for anyone keen on nitpicking). Unapologetically wasting no time with its quick, stuttering percussion intro and diving right into one of the most teeth gnashing, ripping riffs on the album, the straightforward viciousness of the attack here sounds feral and unnervingly intense. Yet not unrestrained, because this is black metal that while redolent with classic tremolo riffing and all the tropes that come with it, feels sequenced with classic heavy metal in mind. I think of the theatricality of the grand shift at the 1:50 mark, with the announcement of the thundering “drums of war”, the downshift in tempo ushering in a glory claw at the skies cinematic bridge, all followed up with the very Quorthon esque solo at the 4:17 mark. If your experience has been similar to mine, you’ve heard so much black metal in various permutations over the years, and over time it all sounds so much like one another that you feel like you lost the thread of what you love about it. So when a primal, bloody, meat on bone experience like this reminds you of how cathartic this music can be, its like hearing black metal again for the first time.

November 5, 2025 2025, Blog related, reviews Post a Comment

The Obligatory Catching Up Piece

So in typical Metal Pigeon fashion, I’ve fallen behind on things I planned to publish, a result of my getting distracted by one notion after another and stopping work on one piece to begin work on another, and subsequently stopping again, yada yada yada. Recently I got set upon a topic that requires a bit more thought and dare I suggest, research, and its taken up all of the free time I allocate to the blog. So while that’s happening, I thought I’d do a quick piece rapidly covering all the new and noteworthy albums that have come out in the past few weeks and months that deserve commenting upon. I imagine that this is going to be the only one of its kind before we stumble into December and I’m scrambling to write up my year end songs and albums lists, so there’s probably going to be things coming out soon (the new Aephanaemer, Omnium Gatherum, and Blut Aus Nord albums) that will not get covered here because I don’t have promos for them. Its fine though, because I’m already drowning in a sea of new music and this is my attempt at coming up for air.

Lets talk about positive stuff first — the albums that really impressed me and that are in a consistent (if not constant) rotation for me since their release. Going to single out the new November’s Doom album Major Arcana here, because damn it all if this isn’t one of their best albums to date. And its always hard to judge Novembers Doom albums as a whole in relation to their catalog, because this is a band that simply does not make bad records. There are albums that don’t resonate or hit as hard as another, and certainly there are albums in their catalog that tower above all the others (Pale Haunt Departure for most, Hamartia for me), but Novembers Doom have been one of the most consistent bands in metal for a very long time now. The new album has one of the year’s best songs right out of the gate in the title track, a ferocious yet forcefully melodic epic that has a masterful performance from vocalist Paul Kuhr. Alongside the crushing “The Fool”, this is as unrelentingly heavy as Novembers Doom has sounded in recent memory, but their ability to showcase dynamic range and light and shade hasn’t diminished, as they illustrate throughout the album. I admit that I have been paying more attention to this album than others in part because we interviewed guitarist Larry Roberts for the MSRcast and Paul Kuhr on Metal Geeks, but the thing is, long after those were recorded, Major Arcana stuck around and has resurfaced as a craving that I have to hit play on to satiate.

In more rapid fire fashion, we just played these guys on the recent episode of the podcast but Manegarm’s new album Edsvuren is yet another in a string of incredibly strong albums from these folk metal veterans. Vibrantly energetic and confident, this is the sound of a band that understands its sound so perfectly that they’re able to experiment and broaden their range within those boundaries without ever sounding like they’re trying to be something they’re not. At times intense and blistering, and others beautifully serene and harmonious, this is everything that I think a lot of viking imagery based bands wish they could sound like but lack the musical identity to accomplish. If you’ll recall, this band’s last two albums have made my year end best albums lists in 2019 and 2022, and without spoiling things, its highly likely they’re going to find themselves there again in 2025. Similarly, the new Vintersorg album Vattenkrafternas Spel continues to astound a month now into listening to it, and it conjures up feelings of both nostalgic wistfulness and just real, raw excitement that the old master himself still has that magic whatever it is that defines his sound. With a sound that is uniquely his own, there is no real comparison one can make to any other folk artist except maybe with someone as idiosyncratic as Myrkur or Saor who have such distinct musical identities that make their music unmistakable. In some ways he is continuing where he left off from 2017’s Till fjälls del II, albeit with songwriting that feels more streamlined and flowing, less progressive in its overall structure. Opinions vary on Vintersorg’s more proggy albums, and I actually love his most progressive offering in The Focusing Blur, but I adore when he just lets the folkiness take over his sound and steer him to those Otyg roots as he’s doing here.

I’m also uncertain if I mentioned this on the blog, but a few months ago I traveled up to Austin to see German pagan folk artists Faun in a small, intimate venue called Come and Take It Live (its more charming than its name suggests). It was their first time in Texas, and it was a magical gig, definitely different from a metal show (they don’t have electric guitars in this band for starters) as they wielded a variety of instruments that I’ve rarely or never gotten to see performed live (such as the plethora of strange percussion hand instruments that I couldn’t even begin to describe). They were effortlessly charming on stage and they took a budding, curious casual fan in me into a die hard who sacked their merch table for two t-shirts and a hoodie I’m eagerly awaiting colder weather to wriggle into, but their new album wasn’t available until two months later. Those months elapsed, and I’ve been digging into said new album HEX quite a bit, itself much darker and experimental than some of their more major key adorned cheerful tunes that have the higher play counts on Spotify. My go to recommendation for anyone new to this band is to check out their pro-shot live show at Hellfest 2023, because seeing them live is an experience and that setlist is a perfect introduction to their catalog and vibe in general. Then if you enjoyed that, give HEX a shot with a fair warning that although it has catchy moments within, its a more mood driven affair, but one that is captivating to me for what its worth.

Okay, moving onto murkier territory… I don’t think there was anything I outright disliked that came out recently, but certainly there is stuff that I have mixed feelings about. Lets talk about the big one first, the new Amorphis album Borderland, which despite its refreshingly crushing and demonstrative lead single “Bones”, might be a contender for the biggest disappointment of the year, if not for the glum reality that I’m not entirely surprised by this outcome. With the exception of that truly fine single, this is a step down from 2022’s Halo, which itself was plagued with unevenness, but Borderland is mired in a mid-tempo morass that feels like a chore to slog through at times. There’s some moments that pop here, “Fog to Fog” has a evocative melody and strong hook working for it, and Esa Holpainen’s guitar work on “The Lantern” stands out as a highlight, but this is not enough. The band switched producers here to Jacob Hansen after many albums with Jens Bogren at the helm, and I’ll be damned if nothing sounds different with the change, but the notion of changing producers all of a sudden perhaps hints at the band knowing that they had to shake something up. So it should alarm them and critical fans as well that the band sounds like they’re spinning their wheels, and maybe its because keyboardist Santeri Kallio has written the majority of the songs here — all of which are of course keyboard melody forward and relatively similar in pacing and tone.

Pick a song from Borderlands at random and it sounds fine, sometimes catchy or otherwise pleasant enough, but string them together as a full length album and this is an exhausting, unmemorable listen. And look, I’m not suggesting a vocalist change or a member change, these guys are all longtime members and this is still a damn good band, but the last time they touched greatness was a decade ago with Under the Red Cloud. They need a shakeup, and if a producer change won’t do it, they might consider looking inwards at their own creative process and jolt their own sound with sharp turns towards pure aggression or even pure clean vocals (close to what Swallow the Sun did with Shining last year). Tomi’s harsh vocals just don’t hit as hard as they should across an entire album, and the back and forth growl/clean switching feels like its on autopilot at the moment. Maybe Esa takes over songwriting for the next one, pushing the band into a more riff centric direction and we scale back the keyboards (so much of the sameness comes from Santeri’s keyboard arrangements sounding very similar song to song). I’ve found myself going back to older albums whenever I want to hear this band, because their current sound has worn thin. What a drag to have to write negatively about this band’s new albums three times in a row now, but its where I’m at.

Pivoting to Battle Beast and their newest, Steelbound, which like its title suggests is a bit of a shift towards a more classic heavy metal approach away from the strong ABBA vibes of their previous album Circus of Doom. I dunno what the consensus was on that prior album, but I loved it because it pushed vocalist Noora Louhimo to the forefront of the songs and really made her incredible emotive range the centerpiece of its songwriting. On Steelbound, the songs that really work are not coincidentally the ones that stay faithful to this tried and true method, and on tunes where the band amps up the attack to force Louhimo to start belting like she’s Doro, the hooks seem less impactful, her vocal delivery less compelling. This is a good album, but this uneven refusal to commit to their strengths fully prevent it from reaching the lofty heights of Circus of Doom, nor even the Roxette steeped spunkiness of their 2019 album No More Hollywood Endings. Maybe the criticism of those albums from fans got the band thinking it was time to lean back to metal, but to me anyway, that’s not their strong suit, and that should be okay. You have a really compelling vocalist who flourishes on expressive melodies and soaring deliveries, let her cook and step out of the way with the riffage. Heavier is not always better, this is a built-in tendency of metal having so many flavors (subgenres), because what works for thrash metal or death metal doesn’t necessarily make a glam or power metal song better.

The other contender for biggest disappointment of the year is the new Sabaton album, Legends, which feels like a compilation album of b-sides that they’ve gathered up from various writing sessions and polished off to pack onto this aimless release. It’s a lackluster follow-up to their two World War I themed albums which really did feel fresh and inspired, particularly The Great War with its bleaker, darker tone reflected in the grinding, doomy approach of some of the songs. The follow-up The War to End All Wars was slightly less compelling, but contained the sterling single “Christmas Truce” which even the most curmudgeonly Sabaton critic should have been able to admit was a great song. But on Legends, it really does feel like some of these ideas have been recycled in a less obvious fashion, or that the band is taking the synth+vocal melody blueprint too far, as on the bumbling “Hordes of Khan”, in contention for the worst Sabaton song ever. Similarly “I, Emperor” is an aimless, paint-by-numbers dud that should be far greater given its subject matter (Napoleon Bonaparte), and I can’t imagine how pissed off Vlad the Impaler would be if he heard “Impaler”…such a tepid paean to one of history’s more horrifying figures. There’s bright spots here amidst the gloom, “Crossing the Rubicon” has a cracking chorus drop reminiscent of the best stuff off The Art of War, and “A Tiger Among Dragons” has an interestingly structured chorus, and “Maid of Steel” brings back that old Metalizer vibe that we’ve heard so little of in recent years. But damn does this album sound tired, and I expect better songwriting from Joakim Broden. This is a band that needs an inspiring concept to sound inspiring, and Legends wasn’t it.

August 29, 2025 2025, Black Metal, Helloween, Power Metal, reviews Post a Comment

Giants and Monsters For Real: New Helloween and Blackbraid

Arriving at the near end of a summer release season that was mostly predominated by new albums from lesser known and up and coming artists, two big names in the legendary Helloween and rising black metal force Blackbraid are back with highly anticipated releases. To say these two albums have preoccupied most of my listening time is an understatement, because with the exception of brief forays into what my circle of metal listening friends have been checking out, as well as the indulgent dips into old stuff (Megadeth for instance has been top of mind lately because of their recent bombshell news), these two albums have been pretty much all I’ve been listening to. They’re both pivotal releases for each of the bands involved for different reasons: First with Helloween, the power metal veterans are delivering their sophomore album Giants & Monsters with this post-reunion lineup that saw Michael Kiske and Kai Hansen return to the fold, and following up their wildly successful self-titled album from 2021 that saw them revitalize their sound and surpass many fans already high expectations (this one included). Really the main question looming over the release of this new album is if it can continue and perhaps expand on what this expanded band lineup has demonstrated they’re capable of.

For Blackbraid, this is the pivotal third album in their career, and though their last album was good, it did suffer from a tiny amount of the sophomore slump in that it didn’t sustain the excitement they generated on their debut back in 2022. It’s not always this way, but historically we’ve seen a lot of bands careers hinge on their third album as the one that cemented their status as vital artists or perhaps even stars in the making. Blackbraid has everything they need heading into this release, namely a unique take on a subgenre that is oversaturated with similar sounding bands, and the budding hype generated by their previous two albums that made waves in the metal community. If they can make the most of this moment like Unto Others did last year with Never, Neverland, and rise to another level with an incredible release, they more than any other black metal band on the landscape right now have the potential to be the next biggest thing.

Helloween – Giants & Monsters:

I’m hard pressed to think of a better recent example of why the choice of lead off single is such a pivotal decision in how fans anticipation for a new album might be altered or skewed far in advance of its release, often for the worse. Most of the people in power metal circles I’m privy to were scratching their heads over “This Is Tokyo” back when it was first premiered back in June, and I suspect its mostly because it wasn’t a showcase of the band’s three vocalists in a fireworks display such as “Skyfall” was back in advance of the self-titled album in 2021. This is a fairly proto-typical Andi Deris penned tune, largely in the vein of other Deris penned tracks which means its built around a massive hook, with a pop-rock tinge to its hard rockin’ attack. It’s a good song, a solid rocker, though nothing earth shattering, but it sits well in the context of the album — as an advance single however it led to some disgruntled fans. The choice of second single being the Sascha Gerstner penned “Universe (Gravity For Hearts)” would have been a far more wise choice as the lead single, not just for Kiske’s lead vocal presence, but for its racing, autobahn ready power metal tempo reflecting all the shiny qualities of vintage Helloween that typically get power metal fans salivating. The underlying sentiment here is that hopefully those fans who were quizzical or unhappy about “This Is Tokyo” have a long enough attention span to have checked out the second single and the album, but in 2025 that’s not a given.

Rarely do I just dive into the nitty gritty of an album straight away in a review as I did above, but what preamble about Helloween can I possibly give? I was lucky enough to get a chance to listen to this in advance of its release, and I’m going to enjoy sitting back and reading the discussion shortly after its out to see whether the general consensus lines up with mine — which is, that this is a genuinely excellent Helloween album, a vibrant continuation of what was ignited on the self-titled, albeit falling just short of meeting that album’s lofty heights. Truth be told, that’s about the most I was realistically hoping for, because had the band been able to top the last one, we’d be talking about a top three Helloween album in their career, which is where Helloween comfortably sits in my view. To say Giants & Monsters is jostling with other slightly less than legendary Helloween albums such as the excellent Master of the Rings and The Dark Ride is a fair assessment, I guess where it would fall in the rankings is largely mood dependent for me.

What cements its status among such stellar company are songs such as the album opener “Giants on the Run”, a Deris and Hansen vocal combo over a tremendous riff sequence that even features one of those classic Gamma Ray-ian mid-song bridges that shift the entire tempo and tone of things into folky balladry, before catapulting us back into the stratosphere on the backs of a glorious harmonized lead guitar solo. I vacillate on whether or not this is my favorite tune on the album alongside two others I’ll mention below, but this is the best possible intro track for this album by far. Kiske’s introduction arrives on “Savior Of The World” and its still surprising how fittingly the songs he’s singing lead vocals on seem to be tailor made for him, even though the band tends to write with the approach that anyone could sing lead on any given tune. I think that Kiske is at his best when given that long, long runway on verses to deliver that gradual soaring, effortless rise that sends a tune airborne, and this was no exception. The following Deris cut “A Little Is A Little Too Much” acts as a palette cleansing change of pace, a mid-tempo groove based banger that I have been obsessed over since I first heard it. There’s a tinge of dare I suggest, glam rock to the chorus here, a T-Rex meets Def Leppard vibe with the way Deris deftly delivers the wordplay in the chorus that I find really endearing. I love this song and it is serious competition for my favorite on the album despite its straightforward simplicity, though I concede others might find this too poppy (read: Deris-y).

Hansen gets in on the solo songwriting with “We Can Be Gods” and “Majestic”, and its interesting to hear just how easily he can blur the lines between the hard hitting Gamma Ray approach that characterized so many of their classic songs with the more tunefully melodic approach that best serves Kiske’s vocals as on the former. I particularly love the classic Gamma Ray-ian guitar solo in “We Can Be Gods” that kicks in at the 2:44 mark, a sound that is energizing and familiarly comforting all at once. The latter, “Majestic”, is a far more ambitious animal, a lengthy, spacious epic that sounds like a close cousin to Gamma Ray classics such as “Abyss of the Void” and “Rebellion In Dreamland”. Its placement as the finale of the album is well chosen because it does have an all encompassing, epic quality to its segmented passages that are thundering and dramatic. It feels like an album closer, particularly the final few minutes where things convalesce into a rapid metallic attack with serious riffs and a scorching lead solo overhead.

I’ll conclude with what I suspect will be the most overlooked cuts on the album, Gerstner’s solo penned “Hand of God”, maybe the catchiest moment on the entire album, another in an impressive list of songwriting credits for the “new” guy. It’s possible that Gerstner is one of the strongest songwriters going in the band right now, able to craft tunes that are built with Helloween DNA while achieving the tightrope feat of existing outside the power metal mold. It tends to work spectacularly well with Deris at the vocal helm, as is the case here, and you’ll remember that one of the best tunes from the last album, “Best Time” was a Gerstner/Deris composition. Weikath’s other composition is also an ultra catchy monster in “Under the Moonlight”, one of the most cheery Helloween songs we’ve heard in ages, but its stuffed so far back in the tracklist that you wonder if its going to get lost to people doing a casual sweep of the record. But best for last is the Deris penned “Into the Sun”, a beautiful, melancholy ballad that of course no Helloween album goes without according to Weikath. This is a stunning song, and one of the band’s best ever ballads, a perfect duet between Deris and Kiske that highlights both vocalists in a way that reminds me of their joining together on “Forever and One” on the tour two years ago. The synergy between these two singers really feels cemented here, and overall, this album exudes a feeling that this lineup is permanent, and hopefully we get a few more albums out of them.

Blackbraid – Blackbraid III:

I was looking around like a doofus for a black metal album to compare this to, when it hit me like a ton of bricks. What Blackbraid’s straightforwardly titled third album really reminds me of in all its epic, narrative driven, album-wide cinematic scope is something like Blind Guardian’s Nightfall in Middle Earth, or Kamelot’s Epica, with all those beautiful little interludes serving as connective tissue that links all the hard hitting, memorable songwriting together into one cohesive masterpiece. Yes, the new Blackbraid album is a veritable masterpiece, that word that tends to get casually thrown around all too often (you should see the press releases I get in my inbox) so I try to reserve its usage on this blog for when it really counts, and it really — really counts right now. This might be the most excited about a black metal album that I’ve been since Enslaved’s Axioma Ethica Odini way back in 2010 or Darkthrone’s The Underground Resistance in 2013… its been a long time either way dammit.

Everytime I listen to this album, which has been a frigging lot, I play it from start to finish, no skipping around, and that’s not just because its a no-skip album full of intense bangers. Its because this is one of those rare albums where the interstitial aspects of the album are integral to the listening experience as a whole. There are several pieces here, “Dusk (Eulogy)”, “The Earth Is Weeping”, “Traversing the Forest of Eternal Dusk”, and “Like Wind Through the Reeds Making Waves Like Water” which are instrumental in composition, yet varied enough in their makeup to stand apart from each other and arrive at intentional moments within the tracklisting. I normally excoriate bands for including intros in their albums, but “Dusk” is a mood setter that actually works, setting us in a headspace of a North American wilderness that matches the colors and tones of the album artwork. Similarly, “The Earth Is Weeping” is a canopy of strummed acoustic guitar figures and animal calls and the crackle of a fire burning that works incredibly well as a momentary pause between two of the album’s heaviest cuts. My favorite is the beautiful lead guitarwork that comes at the end of the flute laden “Traversing the Forest of Eternal Dusk” that mirrors the acoustic guitar melody. That crunchy, Dissection-y tone is awesome and I love its use in that spot.

But where Blackbraid really leaves its mark is of course within the metal itself, and these are the best songs that Sgah’gahsowáh has put together. The lead off single and first non-intro song “Wardrums at Dawn on the Day of my Death” is song of the year list material, the kind of door breaking down ass kicker that reminds me of Immortal (clearly a big influence at work on this project as a whole). Immense riffs with propulsive power, Neil Schneider’s immaculately intricate percussion (he’s been on all the albums so far and his drumming has been phenomenal across the board), and Sgah’gahsowáh grim screaming like a possessed forest ghoul combine to supreme effect. I appreciate that there is an effort made to balance out the extreme elements with equal doses of melodicism, as on the lead melody that sits atop the anchor riff in “The Dying Breath of a Sacred Stag”, and indeed throughout this song, melody drips from nearly every twist and turn, even on the fading outro effect where we’re left with a lone acoustic melody (one of my favorite details on the album).

The a cappella black metal screamed vocal intro to “God of Black Blood” is one of those ideas that shouldn’t work on paper, and yet for its audacity it succeeds as a satisfying segue into its hypnotic riff sequence. The visceral intensity of the vocal performance on this song is impressive, and there’s an argument to be made that for all the focus on the folk instrumentation mixed throughout Blackbraid’s music that we’re not giving Sgah’gahsowáh enough credit for his vocal prowess. In a recent interview with New Noise Magazine, he said about the process of writing and editing new material, “When it comes to writing… I ask myself, ‘Does this make you want to bang your head fucking crazy hard?’ If the answer is no—if it doesn’t make you want to fucking punch a wall or some shit—I get rid of it. With a lot of songs, whenever I’m struggling during the writing, I say, if I was watching this live, would it make me fucking want to go crazy?“. That approach is what I hear on those aforementioned songs and on “Tears of the Dawn”, with nearly every aspect of the song devoted to sheer intensity and headbanging intentionality. Even on a nine minute epic such as “And He Became the Burning Stars…”, I appreciate that central focus on headbanging riffs and memorability that focus the sonic intensity into something you can move along to.

I’ve seen criticism come Blackbraid’s way, even with the new album, from a vocal few in the black metal world, particularly on Reddit where there’s a lot of mentioning the very similar Bathory riff heard in this record, and that much of the vocal approach is close to Immortal’s Abbath. I’m not too bothered about this, one because that riff sounds great within the context of the album, and two didn’t Blackbraid release a cover of “A Fine Day to Die” on the last album? Crafting your complaint about a band around a riff that bears striking similarity to one of their main influences seems silly. Black metal bands pilfer from their inspirations fairly often, and I don’t personally care about a minor instance of it to invalidate the entire work of an artist. And that his vocals alongside riff progressions sound vaguely Immortal-ish? Good! I love Immortal, it’s probably why I love Blackbraid too. I suspect most of the complaints from the black metal sect are based on angst at seeing this relatively new band get attention from unlikely places such as the New York Times and other mainstream outlets. Maybe it’s just about getting older, but when the music is this goddamned great I have zero ability to give a damn about stuff like that anymore. I’m excited about being this excited about a black metal album again, that’s all I care about.

July 23, 2025 2025, Blog related, rant Post a Comment

Gateways and Gatekeepers

I waffled back and forth on writing this, at first because I wasn’t entirely sure if my thoughts on the topic were coherent even to myself, but secondly, because I expect that it will be easy for what I’m saying to be misconstrued or distorted simply because certain terms tend to bring along their own baggage whenever you use them. Gatekeeping is of course the term in question that I’m referring to, and its come up a lot more lately with the surge in popularity of Sleep Token, a band that I don’t have strong feelings on one way or another. Their sound is interesting, like a more soulful Linkin Park with the harder edges sanded off a bit, dressed up in a gothic meets cult (as in the hooded mysterious kind, not the “Firewoooomon” declaring kind) visual package that is appealing to me for its attempt at showmanship and ambition. I’m glad they’re successful, and hopeful that they are drawing a younger audience that is perhaps new to rock music or even rock adjacent music, let alone metal. A happy consequence of the success they’re having is it establishes a new arena level band that can invite along up and coming support acts, and establishes a festival headliner for the future as well as acting as a gateway band for newcomers to heavier music. Ahhhh! The gate!

That root word that enflames so many an online bickerings. Yes, there is a gate, and there have always been gateway bands and yes, gatekeeping attitudes, but I believe that its meaning and usage has been distorted by social media to only mean something ugly, repressive, and exclusionary — and I disagree with that definition. And it may seem like I’m just singling out social media in particular as the culprit here, but it has been hard not to notice that most of the discourse surrounding this term is largely percolating within places such as X, Bluesky, Facebook, and most glaringly, Threads. I’ll single out the latter since its where I’ve been seeing most of this kind of performative rage bait posting that gets airlifted to the top of my feed due to the algorithm (which still promotes posts over a half a year old as long as it generates views). Maybe I’m being too harsh, and there was a precluding incident with another metalhead that sparked that thread in the first place, but somehow, I doubt it. Gatekeeping as defined by that and similar social media posts decrying it are I believe an exclusively online phenomenon that happens within various social media platforms comments sections, where good faith and societal decency begin to decay and turn into something toxic.

Awhile back I wrote a history of my becoming a metalhead, and I shared an anecdote about the one pivotal time I might have actually been gatekept by two older metalheads who were in my percussion section in junior high band. It was a catalyzing moment in my life as a metalhead, because despite the hostility I received from one of them (shoutout Chad!), their admonition to me to look beyond mainstream metal (in this particular case, Metallica) and learn about other bands was critical to my entire mindset. Before that incident, I figured that the only bands worth checking out were the big ones I had heard of, and that the unknown bands just weren’t as good, but those two guys (even though they could be jerks about it) forced me to change my entire mindset and start learning and exploring. Something I neglected to mention in that linked article is that I would often come back to them when I’d learn about another awesome band and talk about what I’d heard, and they’d gruffly chime in with what they thought I should check out next. So yeah they were acting like gatekeepers in a way, but they didn’t discourage me from learning more about metal, quite the opposite actually, they were helping to guide me through the gate and pointing out which way to travel once through.

That imagery, of the gatekeeper, I’ve always likened to something akin to the figure Hammerfall’s Glory to the Brave cover, a stoic, battle-hammer wielding, armored guardian who is refusing entrance to some short sleeved poseurs meekly attempting to get by to the hellscape that exists beyond. Its a ridiculous thought of course, and not entirely helpful here because there’s no physical gate in this artwork either, so lets imagine one anyway for the purposes of this thought experiment. Is the gatekeeper always defined as someone who is keeping others out, or can the role of a gatekeeper be to welcome newcomers, and usher them through the gate while pointing or guiding them towards worthwhile paths? Extrapolating this to music, we all got here through a gateway of some kind, be it the first time you heard a Metallica or Iron Maiden song, or maybe you unwittingly tagged along to a metal show with an older sibling or friend and it blew your mind. No one started out in metal already loving second wave Norwegian black metal before they had heard something far more broader in reach, something more mainstream and palatable. So we all started to walk through a gateway, and hopefully, all of us were lucky enough to have a gatekeeper who helped us navigate our way through the wilderness once we were through.

My real life experience that I detailed above happened in the mid-90s, before social media and internet discourse ruled so much of our interactions with fellow human beings. I realize in watching older documentaries such as Heavy Metal Parking Lot and the Decline and Fall of Western Civilization that in those times, gatekeeping was very much a tangible, in your face thing that was happening to people all the time. Woe must have befallen the unsuspecting person wearing a glam metal t-shirt in that Judas Priest parking lot for example, and I’m not saying that was okay by any means, but it was how things were back then, the culture of its time, the same as my incident in my junior high band hall. Today, where we walk into bars or even restaurants and see people with their faces bent downwards staring at their phones, the very nature of our interpersonal interactions have changed dramatically (a topic for another time and place perhaps). What I’m getting at here, is that metal gatekeeping doesn’t happen in public — if you’re an exception to this, if someone has asked you to name three songs by the band whose shirt you’re wearing, you weren’t being gatekept, that person was just being an a-hole (and I realize this happens to women metalheads at times and I wish it didn’t). What I think this “gatekeeping” that so many social media posts are decrying is really just the volatility of comments on social media posts where anonymity or the newly dubbed online disinhibition effect (that being the reduced sense of restraint people feel when interacting online compared to face-to-face interactions) is in full swing.

I’m among a plethora of metalheads who are airing their thoughts on this in far more articulate ways than I likely am, such as John Barbas who explored it in depth with this episode of his Heavy Metal Philosophy show; or Steve Bryne’s really good piece in Loudwire on this very topic. One of the recurring things we’re all coming back to is the notion of whether or not gatekeeping really exists at all, or are we all jumping at online phantoms in the form of barbed and pointed random social media comments and getting up in arms about them. The people writing those comments that appear gatekeeper-ish actually have no way to gatekeep anything, they’re not excluding you from a potential circle of friends because of your Def Leppard shirt, they’re not preventing you from listening to whatever you want to hear, they’re just being jerks online, because its so easy to be a jerk online. And I’m really starting to feel that the people who stand stentorian on the mount, hands on hips as they decry those comments are also participating in a form of jerkdom — maybe one that’s fundamentally worse, because they’re seeking arguments and reactions in favor of gaining clout, likes, or whatever statistic serves the dopamine hit for them. I’m calling for all of us to just become more aware of this schtick as a whole, because it is schtick from both sides, and its taking advantage of our already plugged in states and just causing conflict for no reason. Lets be productive metalheads, be encouraging, spread the word of bands we love and albums we care about, and try to ignore the noise.

May 18, 2025 2025, Blog related, Brainstorm, The Metal Pigeon Recommends Post a Comment

The Metal Pigeon Recommends — Part Six: Brainstorm

One of the most overlooked bands to storm out of Germany, Brainstorm are veteran traditional/power metal stalwarts who have been delivering quality heavy metal since 1997 with their aptly titled debut Hungry. I first remember hearing about them in 2001 from Dr. Metal’s Metal Meltdown show on WRUW in Cleveland (I’ve mentioned him before, particularly in my biographical essay, but he was a huge influence on me in terms of introducing power and trad metal bands from Europe). The band’s then newly joined vocalist Andy B. Franck (the cadence of his full name always makes me smile) was on the show and they were talking about the new album, his other band Symphorce (also underappreciated), and generally just shooting the breeze about anything and everything. Dr. Metal’s interviews were always excellent, but Andy was particularly engaging, humorous and easy going, and I not only liked the tracks I heard being played, but became an instant fan of the band just by virtue of wanting to root for the guy.

Personality aside, he’s been one of the most unheralded great vocalists in power metal for the past two plus decades, a model of consistency like fellow Germans Mille Petrozza and Klaus Meine (something in those Rhine fed waters I guess?). But it wasn’t just Franck that was the draw, because guitarists Torsten Ihlenfeld and Milan Loncaric dished out a heavier, beefier take on the Judas Priest-ian twin guitar attack, with thundering, rumbling riffage and tasteful harmonized leads. Ihlenfeld and Franck seemed to immediately gel as songwriting partners (alongside contributions from the rest of the band), and formed the core of a songwriting partnership that has carried the band up to the present day. They just released a genuinely incredible album this year in Plague of Rats, one that could easily claim the title of the best in their discography. But rather than just discuss that album, I thought it might be better to properly introduce newcomers to Brainstorm and their intimidatingly lengthy discography via this recurring feature I’ve employed previously to talk about other bands I’m passionate about. I’ve picked out ten songs from their discography that I think might make a fan out of you, and am presenting them below in chronological order. So get some bratwurst, some schnitzel, and die Biere, and check out the bangers below!

“Tell-Tale Heart” (Hungry, 1997)

The early years of Brainstorm featured singer Marcus Jürgens (ex-Pump, TwentyDarkSeven) in the lineup, whose vocal approach was a little rougher around the edges and lighter in tone than Andy B Franck (who at this time was still in his pre-Brainstorm band Ivanhoe and only on the verge of forming Symphorce, his other long term ongoing concern). It’s fair to say that these first two albums Hungry and Unholy didn’t gain much traction beyond German and European trad metal circles, but they did enough to garner the notice of Metal Blade records who helped the band breakout continentally on 2000’s Ambiguity. Jürgens does have a little John Bush thing happening vocally that I’ve always found interesting, like Brainstorm unwittingly grabbed an American posing as a German for the job, but he’s a great fit for where the band was at this time. They were finding their footing, and you can hear shades of the more richly melodic, quasi-epic direction they’d continue on later, but for the most part, this is straight forward meat and potatoes heavy metal. This gem, buried in the middle of their debut was always the standout on both albums for me, a legitimate rhythmic headbanger with a knock out hook.

“Blind Suffering” (Metus Mortis, 2001)

The first genuine fan favorite in the band’s history, “Blind Suffering” has been a concert staple since Metus Mortis dropped in 2001 and made waves over the European metal mainland. Just a flat out bruiser, that memorable drum pattern intro and one of the band’s most straight to the gut riff progressions to follow. This was Andy B Franck’s second album with the band, and his signature approach within the band’s style really came to gel here, that being a blended Udo-Mustaine-Kiske booming bellow that he’d layer up in the choruses to elevate their impact. It worked spectacularly well, so well in fact that he never really stopped doing it, and it gave the band’s sound a splash of the grandiose and epic pomposity that fellow countrymen Blind Guardian were of course serving up in full course platters by this point in their career. Was bummed to notice that they’d finally left this off their setlists in recent years, I’m assuming because the discography got so long as to edge it out — they should bring it back though, its an all time classic.

“The Leading” (Soul Temptation, 2003)

One of a pair of bangers from the band’s breakout album Soul Temptation, “The Leading” is one of the band’s best marriages of hooky and heavy. Built on meat and potatoes heavy chugging with a splash of prog complexity in the riff progressions, I always thought that this was the era where the band sounded closest to their peers in Tad Morose, particularly around this same era when the latter were releasing their bonafide masterpiece with Urban Breed in Modus Vivendi. Pair that with bands such as Kamelot, Circle II Circle, and Manticora releasing incredible albums full of darker toned power metal that was heavier in tone and in spirit, and Brainstorm found themselves in the midst of a full blown sea change in what was considered de rigueur in power metal circles. Yet Franck’s vocals provide soaring uplift, a deft demonstration of his rarely deployed higher register that showed some classic power metal had rubbed off on this band of Germans. This is one of those old power metal jams that just randomly will pop into my head at any odd moment, a hook that is likely burned into my brain forever.

“Shivas Tears” (Soul Temptation, 2003)

The iconic track from Soul Temptation, and the likely inspiration for its surreal cover art, this gem has always been characterized by the prominence of Miro Rodenburg’s layered, lush keyboard arrangement. He had been working with the band since Metus Mortis, but really got to go hog wild for the first time here, bringing an Indian-flavored arrangement into the proceedings to complement the song’s lyrical theme. The juxtaposition between its floral, incense smoke perfumed notes and the pummeling, mechanistic riffs was entrancing and hypnotic. My favorite association with this tune is their epic show opening performance of it at Wacken 2004, thankfully immortalized on professionally shot video. Do yourself a favor by settling in to watch that live show, because they are on fire and Franck is as convincing and effective a frontman as power metal during that era, easily one of my favorite Wacken sets of all time. That’s a crowd that only partially knows the band, and they’re all headbanging along to this tune because how the hell could you not?

“Fire Walk With Me” (Downburst, 2008)

The band had a slight misstep with 2005’s Liquid Monster, which although boasting the band’s first charting single “All Those Words” (top five in Hungary) largely fell short of the standards set on the preceding Franck fronted albums. Our first taste of their rebound three years later on Downburst was this absolute banger of a single in “Fire Walk With Me”, with a direct, hard hitting approach that shook off some of the choir/orchestral excesses of Liquid Monster. This song is emblematic of the album, getting back to the core of what Brainstorm did so well in stuffing head noddingly catchy vocal lines amidst thunderingly heavy guitars. The rhythmic call and response gang vocals here always reminded me of a thrash approach as well, something akin to Anthrax or Armored Saint, and they’re a vivid reminder here that Ihlenfeld and Loncaric have been solid backing vocalists throughout the history of the band. I imagine hardcore Brainstorm fans will argue that there’s deeper cuts on Downburst worthy of recognition (one of them is below), but I remember how much this single fired everyone up (including me) back in the day, and that’s worth its inclusion here.

“How Do You Feel” (Downburst, 2008)

It’s interesting how in retrospect there’s a growing consensus that Downburst is arguably the bands best album — though I feel that some might look back further to Metus Mortis or Soul Temptation (particularly the band themselves regarding the latter, having given a direct nod towards it on their recent new album). For my part, I waffle between all three but having dived into Downburst once again for this feature, I’m reminded of just how awesome this album is, running lean throughout, with a sharper sense of balancing keyboard elements with a return to a heavier hitting style, and a production that might be their career best. And this tune in particular I think exemplifies all those aforementioned details that the band got right on the album. I love the Dokken-ian riff progressions during the verses, particularly after the chorus with that gorgeously melodic outro solo. Franck’s deft vocal melodies veer between smooth emotiveness, and that rugged, throaty sandpaper growl that gives the chorus its grit and grime. My favorite song off this incredible album, this is the album to start with from the band for newcomers.

“The Conjunction of 7 Planets” (Memorial Roots, 2009)

A deep cut on one of the band’s most divided albums in Memorial Roots, “The Conjunction of 7 Planets” saw the band sharply moving into more lengthy, progressive territory. Like the album as a whole, there was less of the razor sharp attacking riffs heard on Downburst and more of a grittier, earthen tone to these songs, matching the album artwork and title at that. This tune took awhile to grow on me, with its slowly building, patience requiring verse passages and longer flowing refrain sequence, but it was the lyrical subject matter about religious end time prophecies and their usage to subjugate believers with fear that really stood out. Brainstorm always had competent lyrics, but I thought the band elevated their game as whole on this album. An interesting note on the production, because the earthen toned, rounder edges throughout this album caused some debate among fans at the time of its release, and this was maybe a result of the producer Sascha Paeth favoring that style as a whole (recall that the Edguy and Avantasia releases he produced around that time were also mixed in this vein). The band seemed to agree with those fans because in 2016 they released a remixed version of this album (Memorial Roots Re-Rooted) remixed by their longtime producer Achim Köhler who had been with them since the Metus Mortis days. Tellingly, the band kept on working with Miro for keyboard parts but never returned to Paeth for production or mixing duties, eventually switching to Orden Ogan’s Seeb Levermann, for good it seems.

“Ravenous Minds” (Midnight Ghost, 2018)

We fast forward almost a decade in time to 2018 and the release of Midnight Ghost, the band’s first album with Levermann handling production and in many ways assisting the band in revitalizing their sound to astonishing success. The decade since the last track on this list yielded three fairly middle of the road albums, pockmarked with some decent songs, but admittedly some filler bloat, and if streaming numbers are anything to go by, they were largely only listened to by diehard fans of the band, failing to pull in new listeners. That certainly wasn’t the case with “Ravenous Minds”, the biggest song of the band’s career and their first million plus (nearly two million now) streaming hit. Whatever it was about collaborating with Levermann that sparked the band’s creative battery, it filtered throughout the album and yielded one of the strongest albums of their career, as well as the dawning of the more modern sounding Brainstorm that has been their sonic modus operandi ever since. The stomping yet surprisingly epic, Blind Guardian-esque monster of a hook that anchors this song was one of the most earwormy moments in the band’s discography, and easily one of the most vocal melody dependent. Over two decades singing aggressive melodic metal, Franck was proving that he hadn’t lost a step and was only getting better with age.

“Glory Disappears” (Wall of Skulls, 2021)

While “Ravenous Minds” is the band’s most popular song, in second place is the absolutely incredible “Glory Disappears” off the subsequent album Wall of Skulls three years later. If not my favorite Brainstorm tune, easily in the top three, I think the epic, ultra satisfying chorus at work here speaks for itself, this song landing the top five of my best songs of 2021 list. Its also a bit of an anomaly on Wall of Skulls itself, being one of the few mid-paced tunes on an album that largely saw the return of the band’s more uptempo, thrashier sound return after a long spell of mostly mid-tempo paced albums. I remember speculating at the time of its release if the Covid induced layover lit a fire under the band’s you know what, because there’s a renewed vigor and appetite for all things heavy and aggressive on the album as a whole. On “Glory Disappears” however, Franck and company wielded this energy differently, a straight to the emotional gut slice of power metal melodrama built on a hook so potent that they unleashed it thirty seconds into the song. The dual harmony laden guitar solo that nearly serves as a complete outro unto itself is some of Ihlenfeld and Loncaric’s most inspired work. One of those songs that any power metal band would kill to have in their arsenal.

“Garuda (Eater of Snakes)” (Plague of Rats, 2025)

Up now to the present day, where Brainstorm has released a monstrous, year end list contending caliber new album in Plague of Rats, their third legitimately very good to great album in a row. To say we’re in the midst of a late career renaissance by one of German power metal’s most enduring bands is an understatement, because the band is experiencing not only renewed creative inspiration, but watching it translate into their most commercially successful period as well. Not bad for a bunch of dudes who started in 1989 and resolutely stuck to their guns and musical passion for metal through waves and trends that came and went. Regarding “Garuda”, this is a knowing throwback to another song on this list in “Shiva’s Tears” in Indian spirituality and mythology, this time with the tasteful incorporation of Indian melodies via a sitar accompaniment. I love Franck’s choices in vocal melody design here, the delayed effect he employs on the chorus by waiting a half second on delivering “…Garuda!” adds a subtle bit of complexity to the timing there that just hits. I love that this far into their career, they’re now more open than ever to trying new things, such as the Eluveitie esque folk instrumentation that adorns “The Shepherd Girl” later on the album. They’ve covered such a wider breadth of styles on these past three albums that its hard not to consider also recommending them to newcomers as a point of entry to the band.

March 27, 2025 2025, Avantasia, Edguy, Power Metal, Tobias Sammet Post a Comment

Caught Somewhere In Time: Avantasia’s Here Be Dragons

As a self appointed historian on the career of one Tobias Sammet, I can honestly say that the cumulative reaction to Avantasia’s tenth(!) studio album, Here Be Dragons, matches the divisiveness that was achieved by 2006’s The Scarecrow (aka the rebirth of the project from a studio only situation to an ongoing touring concern). Honestly, in some ways it surpasses the furor around that album if only because the bulk of the tumult around it’s release was largely negative towards the single “Lost In Space”, while the reaction towards the rest of The Scarecrow and it’s companion EPs was fairly enthusiastic, glowing even (the title track and cuts such as “Promised Land” and “The Story Ain’t Over” are rightfully considered classics today). Conversely, the discussion around the new album centers entirely upon the album as a whole, with wildly differing opinions, and an array of talking points both positive and negative. This has all been further inflamed not only by Sammet on social media defending lead single “Creepshow”, the most decidedly Edguy sounding song ever to grace an Avantasia tracklist — but by his retaliatory lyrics towards vocal fans of his older power metal style on “Return to the Opera”, a bonus track that is ironically enough being lauded by nearly everyone everywhere as the best song on the album. Oi vey, lets unpack all this.

First off, my thoughts on the album itself are confusing even for me, because on one hand, I really do love a lot of these songs, and yet, I find myself frustrated with their lack of explosiveness in the guitar department and in the overwhelming presence of layered keyboard orchestrations. Lets start with the title track, because despite being the second track on the album, it does admittedly feel like the first actual Avantasia tune on the album (we’ll talk about “Creepshow” in a bit) with a guest vocalist duetting alongside Sammet (Geoff Tate in this case). The chorus here is magnificent, one of the best on the album, arguably one of the strongest in the band’s discography as a whole, but I find myself only perking up when I feel it about to strike again. With the exception of a singular riff progression that serves as a far ahead of time prechorus, the rest of the verses are weighed down with a string of lone chords that fill in the space behind Tate or Sammet in uninspiring fashion. Things pick up in the bridge midway through, with a brisk tempo and a combining of voices on a uplifting melody, but at the 5:56 mark we’re deposited once again into this meandering nothingness. Its just so damn frustrating to not give this awesome chorus a long runway to soar off from… it reminds me of the atmospheric nonsense that sat in the middle of “The Scarecrow” when there should’ve been a ripping, Europower guitar solo in it’s place. Despite it’s faults however, “Here Be Dragons” is quintessential Avantasia, a song I keep coming back to for its regality and dramatic pomp and splendor.

While the aforementioned title track might claim the album’s best chorus, the best guest vocalist pairing surprisingly winds up being Tommy Karevik on “The Witch”. Its not even that Sammet wrote a very Kamelot-ian or Seventh Wonder-ish tune here like he did for Roy Khan back in the day on “Twisted Mind”, its more that Karevik is a bit of a chameleon as a singer, finding a way to fit into any style or song structure and maximize his moment. Honestly, he probably doesn’t get enough credit for this, because I can’t recall ever hearing a bad guest spot from him ever (even on some of the Ayreon stuff where I didn’t particularly enjoy the songwriting). This is a crisp, confident, and incredibly addictive tune wisely chosen as a single that echoes shades of “Dying For An Angel”, and it was a shrewd decision to allow Karevik to handle the first verse on his own, thereby giving the song a very different feel from the rest of the album where Sammet is usually taking the lead on things. Similarly on “Bring on the Night”, ole’ Bob Catley kicks off this power ballad (what else with Catley?) with an immediate vocal melody lead-in on the intro, and while there’s a deliberately overproduced 80’s version of this tune as a bonus track, this original version has washes of mid-80s Magnum in spades, which is rather fitting in a way given that band’s ultimate curtain call earlier last year. Its one of the better Catley centric songs Tobias has penned, easily my favorite since the 2016 Song of the Year “Restless Heart and Obsidian Skies” off Ghostlights

Slightly less in my esteem but certainly strong songs in their own right are “The Moorlands at Twilight” with Michael Kiske (Ernie for you old school fans) making his triumphant return to the project, as well as “Phantasmagoria” with the warrior himself Ronnie Atkins. I enjoy both songs a great deal, particularly the latter where Atkins’ rough, jagged vocals are right in their element on a song that sits in that Hellfire Club-ish power metal meets hard rock pocket. Kiske’s song is a companion piece to “Wastelands” off The Wicked Symphony, with some uptempo Euro-power at work, except this time spliced in with some latter day Avantasia eccentricities to prevent it from being straight ahead power metal. And finally Adrienne Cowan gets a turn on an album after doing some stints as Avantasia’s backing vocalist on tour, and she sounds fantastic on “Avalon”, which thankfully deviates from Sammet’s propensity to relegate women guest vocalists in the past to power ballads. Cowan gets to utilize her throaty belting voice here, the kind she wielded so effortlessly on spectacular Seven Spires tunes such as “Succumb” and “In Sickness, In Health” (maybe Sammet got inspired after duetting with her on “Reach Out For the Light” in place of Kiske on tour). I think that “Against the Wind” is a decent song in it’s entirety (though H.E.A.T.’s Kenny Leckremo is lost as a guest vocal here), but it has the honor of having one of the best moments on the album, with Sammet addressing his critics for the first time on an Avantasia album directly, “If you don’t like what I do / then it’s not made for you”. Finally the Freddy Mercury/Queen tinged “Everybody’s Here Until the End” is a fine album closer, a semi power ballad with a deft chorus, although relegating Roy Khan to a mere spoken/sung passage in the middle seems like a waste of talent.

That leaves us album opener “Creepshow” and the decidedly metallic “Unleash the Kraken” as the final songs here to discuss, and they’re of particular interest in the sense that there are no guest vocalists on both tracks, just Sammet himself. So lets talk about the latter first, because I actually think its an awesome tune and reminds me a ton of something like “Under the Moon” from Hellfire Club, or given the balls to the wall nature of the chorus, “Nailed to the Wheel” from Mandrake, both songs from Edguy albums by the way if you didn’t catch that. I genuinely feel in listening to this tune that it could have fit into the tracklist of either of those albums, and that’s ironic given Sammet’s own insistence on not returning to his power metal roots. Then there’s the flashpoint song in all discussions about this album, “Creepshow”, which sounds like it could have been an Edguy b-side from the Space Police era. It is easily the most middling of all the songs on an otherwise strong Avantasia album. Repetitive, simplistic, and intended as such according to Sammet in its aim, as he explained: “It’s short and catchy, and it emphasizes a facet of my work that has taken a backseat in my music in recent years. It’s light-hearted and the opposite of melancholic. And it’s fresh, boisterous and unabashed – a straightforward kick-ass anthem.” He even admits to it sounding like something from the past, stating “…even though it may seem like a reminiscence of my earlier writing, I think we managed to turn the whole thing into a trademark Avantasia tune…“. Hmmm, I’m not sure how it sounds characteristically like Avantasia, given the lack of other voices — after all, even “Lost in Space” for all its simplified pop-rock sonics had Amanda Somerville adding her vocals into the mix.

So I get where fans are a little confused by this album and Sammet’s mixed messaging both from his running social media soapbox on Facebook and Instagram where he is often vocal about his chosen musical path and sticking to his guns (and real talk, I respect him for his stance at least, though I question his need to declare it all the time), and also from within the context of the album itself. Its not just those two songs sounding like old Edguy that are prompting this confusion either, its the reality that the intentional Metal Opera era throwback bonus track “Return to the Opera” is being declared by many fans as the album’s best song. I disagree… only slightly however, because this is a banger of an old school power metal cut, built on the same DNA that informed all those classic late 90s/early 2000s Edguy and Avantasia records that we all look back so fondly upon. The lyrics of this song are self-explanatory, a mea culpa to fans clamoring for the past and also a plea for them to shut up finally… and I’d be on Sammet’s side 100% if he weren’t so goddamned great at writing stuff like this. Seriously, I have replayed this bonus track over and over again just for the sheer joy it brings me, even though I realize its a bit a joke track. He has said in interviews recently (and even alludes to this within the lyrics of the song) that he enjoyed writing it, but if he had to write an entire album’s worth of songs just like it, it would be disheartening (or drive him to alcoholism given the “Betty Ford” references in the lyrics). I get that sentiment, but I’ll argue that the success in the ears of fans of “Return to the Opera” might work against his intentions in releasing it in the first place.

Thinking it all over, I find myself simultaneously thrilled by this album and frustrated with it. I love most of these songs for their melodies and some truly awesome guest vocal moments (Karevik is the MVP in this category), yet I wish it didn’t sound so pillowy soft in it’s production, and I wish some guests were utilized better such as Roy Khan. I think the heavily layered keyboards that adorn so much of this album end up stifling certain tunes that need a bit more space to breath and let the guitars or singular piano melodies rip (“Everybody’s Here Until the End” needs a bit more Meatloaf/Steinman sharpness and vigor for a start). I think the pendulum has swung too far into the direction of prog at times production wise, and there needs to be a little more Gamma Ray and a touch less Magnum in the overall approach during the mixing phase. And I’ll admit that Sammet’s dip back into older, both Metal Opera-ian and Edguy-ish styles on respective tracks has made me a little nostalgic. I long for more stuff like “Unleash the Kraken”, and really what that means is that I long for Edguy, something that’s not drenched in symphonics or theatrical drama like the past few Avantasia albums. It was a breath of fresh air, and I think many fans of both bands found themselves gratefully gulping it in and eagerly looking around for the next one. That its so brief is frustrating to some and bewildering to many. What exactly is Avantasia supposed to be… a Tobias Sammet solo vehicle, or a group project with a rotating cast of singers? He did well bringing in fresh voices to the mix this time in a substantive way, but maybe now its time to fully reimagine the sound of modern Avantasia into something else instead of repeating the formula of the past few albums.

March 5, 2025 2025, Blog related, reviews Post a Comment

Restless and Wild: 2025’s First Quarter Blitz

I have to admit to being slightly taken aback by just how strong the start to this year has been metal-wise. This is because normally, release calendars get off to a slow, lurching start in the first few wintry months of any year, and only really get frenetic around the springtime, which allows us lazier listeners to dilly dally for awhile in the wake of the post year-end best-of list publishing where we listen to a ton of old stuff or nothing at all. I consider myself lucky in that knowing a bunch of friends who are even more intense about their metal listening than I am yields a handful of best of lists worth delving into, which I’ve been doing diligently through most of these first few weeks. And to that point, normally the first article of the year is a mea culpa talking about all the stuff I’ve missed the year prior, but you know what — I can’t afford to that do this time around because there is so much genuinely exciting new stuff coming out that I owe it to myself to sort out my thoughts on all of it here. So here are some scattered thoughts on a plethora of new things and other odds and ends that have been top of mind recently:

Saor – Amidst the Ruins:

Having lapsed on release date awareness recently, I was happily surprised that Andy Marshall was rewarding my late December and early January constant spins of Forgotten Paths and Origins with a new Saor album. Going into this I had only expectations for the quality of the compositions, because there’s a standard that Marshall had set over the entire discography of the project that was largely characterized by thoughtfulness, depth, and a conveying of emotion. That latter dimension has been one that shifts, because I’d imagine that no one could argue against the idea that Origins (a year end listee in 2022) was strikingly more euphoric in tone than its immediate predecessor. Now while opinions are mixed about that change in tone, I personally loved it and wouldn’t have minded if he continued that trajectory. But credit to Marshall, he pivoted away from it a touch on Amidst the Ruins, which is indeed a darker, more earthen toned album in the vein of Forgotten Paths, though with the added spice of some smoky mysticism, as heard in the striking single “The Sylvan Embrace”. But not entirely, because on “Rebirth”, we get some of those clear eyed lead guitars combined with ringing bagpipes and it gives major Origins vibes. In re-listening to the album just now, I feel the takeaway here is that it’s a combination of moods from the past few records, a sort of career summary in a way, and that’s not a bad thing. I do love it, and though it lacks a transcendent moment such in the extended guitar solo of “Aurora”, its likely to stick in the listening rotation throughout the year.

The Halo Effect – March of the Unheard:

I feel like the general consensus about The Halo Effect’s first album has over the past three years gradually caught up to the opinion that I had of it upon its release, that it sounded far too much like Dark Tranquility for its own good. Sure there were elements of Jesper Stromblad’s signature touch on guitars and the songwriting was at times pretty solid, but Mikael Stanne’s position at the vocal helm was that double edged sword of him being a really fantastic screamer with incredible tone, and yet someone who has had years of developing a clean vocal melody style that is unmistakably recognizable. So recognizable in fact that it was hard to shake the Dark Tranquility vibes leaching into The Halo Effect’s music, particularly when it was largely a mix of scream/clean balancing acts within the songs, a trait that characterized so many of the recent albums of his main band. So on the sequel, they seem to have either heard the criticism and are consciously responding to it, or Jesper has seemingly decided to interject more of his signature guitarwork approach to the band’s sound, because there is a convincing aspect to March of the Unheard that is classic Gothenburg melodeath in terms of pure sound. For that reason alone, I enjoy this album a great deal when I’m actively listening to it, because its hitting those same taste buds that were awakened when I first heard classic In Flames and the rest of the Gothenburg ilk. But I will offer this criticism, that after weeks of listening to this consistently, I still have a hard time identifying most of these songs individually, as they all blur together in this modern melodeath mélange, and that’s been my criticism of Dark Tranquility’s newer albums as well. And I hate piling on Mr. Stanne, because I think he’s a great vocalist, but perhaps he needs guiderails for this project, such as a declarative rule on no clean singing, or no vocal melody driven choruses allowed? A little more Majesties’ Vast Reaches Unclaimed and less Atoma or Endtime Signals would really go a long way.

Majestica – Powertrain:

A fun one from a band led by one Tommy Johansson (ex-Sabaton/ReinXeed) who is in his power metal element here. I have a fond regard for anyone proudly flying the flag of classic power metal (the non-meme sort that is), and Tommy loudly declares that pride on an album that is a natural progression from their 2019 debut Above the Sky and sophomore x-mas concept album A Christmas Carol (if we’re counting that as a regular album I suppose). It also doubles as a tribute to power metal in subtle and not so subtle ways, the latter coming in the form of a unabashed salute to fellow Swedes in Hammerfall on “Megatrue”, with lyrics invoking that band’s album and song titles to amusing effect (well, to us power metal nerds), set to a suitably Hammerfall-ian marching song structure. I hear a little nod towards “Full Moon” ala Sonata Arctica on “No Pain, No Gain”, not only in the keyboards, but in the vocal patterning that does have hints of Tony Kakko. I hear Power Quest on “Victorius” with splashes of Stratovarius, and major Heavenly vibes on “Go Higher” — but alas, I trust that the band didn’t want us to only take away comparisons from this album. On “A Story In the Night”, they unleash a beast of a song that is unmistakably cut from the ReinXeed/Majestica songwriting mold, easily their finest tune to date and one to likely land on the songs of the year candidate list at least. Along with fellow Swede Johannes Skyblazer, Tommy has become one of the leading lights in a resurgence of unabashedly Europower oriented power metal, unafraid of being unfashionable and gimmick free. Its refreshing.

Dawn of Solace – Affliction Vortex:

Really impressed with the new Dawn of Solace, this being Tuomas Saukkonen’s other other band (that second ‘other’ is referring to Before the Dawn, who he brought back from the dead last year with a new singer onboard, that dude from The Voice of Finland reality show), and if that name is still not ringing a clear bell in your head, he’s the main man behind Wolfheart. So with this other band of his, it leans towards less aggression, and more of a focus on Finland’s ongoing love affair with melodic doom through a gothic filter. A two man lineup, Saukkonen’s always excellent harshes are paired against Mikko Heikkilä’s clean vocals, who is a bit of an acquired taste admittedly. He reminds me a lot of Tuomas Tuominen who gothic metal fans might remember as the vocalist on the first two The Man-Eating Tree albums and all those Fall of the Leafe records, sharing a similar tone and cadence in their deliveries. This is a moody, patience requiring affair, with songs that aren’t shy about gradual builds, slower tempos (that doom influence), and payoffs that aren’t hook based. It is a demanding listening experience in that regard, but I keep coming back to it for the depth and raw emotion they’ve mined here. I think if you’re a die-hard aggressive Wolfheart fan, this might be a fifty-fifty proposition, but if you like Finnish gothic metal this might be close enough to pique your interest.

The Night Flight Orchestra – Give Us The Moon:

I should also mention the new album from The Night Flight Orchestra, Give Us The Moon, which continues their locked into 1985 stylistic direction that they’d been splashing around in for the past two albums. I will say this, on one hand, there are some really solid songs here, “Like the Beating Of A Heart” is the band’s best single in ages and “Paloma” is a rather creative take on power balladry (deep pulls from Foreigner’s brand of AOR here) — but on the other hand, I feel like the band is treading familiar ground here that was already covered ad nauseum on the two Aeromantic albums that preceded this. There was a point where it seemed like the band was progressing their sound according to the timeline of the 80s, starting off with their debut album reflecting 1980 or 81, and each successive album moving along with the stylistic shifts in sound that actually occurred in that decade. Now I’m not so sure, maybe they just like this particular mid-80s aesthetic so much they’ve decided to nest here, but I do feel like their sound needs a shakeup. My vote would be to inject some late 80s glam/pop metal vibrancy into the mix on the next album, a little Whitesnake or Europe-ian over the top dramatic flair and some more virtuosic guitarwork. I can only hope anyway.

There were a handful of other releases that I’ll briefly comment on, starting with Master Sword’s Toying With Time being a really stellar listen, and if you heard the recent episode of the MSRcast, you’ll have heard us realizing during recording that it was the band’s final album, as they broke up immediately after its release, which does dampen the mood a bit. Give it a shot though because its a really unique blend of styles, a raspy, deep toned talented vocalist in Lily Hoy, and The Legend of Zelda as lyrical inspiration (a cousin to Fierce Deity in some ways). Italy’s Labyrinth also returned with their first album in four years, In the Vanishing Echoes of Goodbye, and it’s a solid effort that I enjoyed to a certain extent. I will concede that it didn’t have quite the punch of 2021’s Welcome to the Absurd Circus where they leaned more towards classic melodic power metal. Here I get more a progressive vibe, big on dense riff sequences and less on the soaring melodies leading the way, although Roberto Tiranti does go wild on a couple songs. I guess I’m still on the fence about my overall feelings on this album, and it very well might be a grower that hopefully sticks with me through the year.

Elsewhere, there was obviously the new Dream Theater album Parasomnia with Portnoy back in the fold, and while it was alright, I did find that “Bend the Clock” was the most interesting thing they’ve done in ages, a song genuinely brimming with some emotion and a above average vocal from James Labrie. I love the first minute and a half of that song where its such a Steven Wilson/Porcupine Tree vibe that’s happening, with undertones of nostalgia and melancholy… ahhh, if only more of their stuff could be like this I’d be a fan of this band. I listened out of curiosity and didn’t regret it, but probably will only return to that song alone. And the new Dynazty album Game of Faces came out and damn if I can find anything remarkable about it, which makes me sad actually. I don’t know if its just a me problem or that the band has started to repeat themselves, but this all sounds like stuff I’ve heard before, just less catchy. I like Nils Molin quite a bit as a vocalist for this band (unlike in Amaranthe, my criticism of him there should be well documented by now) so this is a total drag for me, so to curb my sadness I’ll end my comments here.

I can’t say that I enjoyed much of Marko Hietala’s solo album Roses From the Deep, but I applaud him getting back out there after dabbling around the metal scene with some solo guest appearances (including a cracking one with Therion on the first Leviathan album in 2021). This has much more in common with Tarot than Nightwish of course, but its so all over the place stylistically that it fell victim to a classic solo album faux pas of not having a cohesive vision. It was more Balls to Picasso and less The Chemical Wedding so to speak. There’s a new Lacuna Coil album out called Sleepless Empire, and I think its solid for what it is, though its back to their more slick, polished direction as opposed to the surprisingly dark and heavy affair that made 2019’s Black Anima very compelling. Cristina Scabbia still sounds ageless to her credit, and they have a sound that works for them, and there are songs on here such as “In Nomine Patris” and “Never Dawn” that are incredibly strong despite the thick production gloss. I do think getting messier and darker with their sound is the way for them to lean, but maybe that’s not an opinion shared by their fans.

I’m still digging into the new Ebonheart, Arion, Kilmara (love that track Daniel Heiman guests on), and Prehistoria albums, as well as Udo’s guest loaded Balls To The Wall – Reloaded, and new The Ferrymen album. I’ll probably leave those to the podcast to talk about because they’ll be old news by the time I’m caught up. Lastly, I’ll mention that I caught my first show of the year this past Sunday at the small room of House of Blues Houston, for Swallow the Sun with Harakiri For the Sky and Ghost Bath and a darkwave opener called Snakes of Russia. Regarding the latter, with all due respect to the singular gentleman who is that artist, darkwave as a live experience is profoundly boring if you don’t have some kind of visual aid to accompany it. At a certain point, I looked around and noticed people staring at their phones or like myself, the floor. His music was fine, it all kinda sounded the same, but would be great background music for working on something, but someone needs to whisper to him about reconsidering it as a live proposition. Ghost Bath were alright, apparently I forgot everything about seeing them in a gig long past, but what struck me this time was their proclamation that they play “rock n’ roll about killing yourself”, and then proceeded to do a black metal era Tribulation imitation for their set. A friend asked after the show, “Are they ashamed of black metal?”. And that was a legit question that hung in the air.

Seeing Harakiri For the Sky was a longtime coming after becoming a fan of the band back in 2018 with Arson, and they did play “Fire, Walk With Me” from that album, but mostly focused on the new one which I’m not as into. The drummer was phenomenal, and of course Matthias Sollak was incredible on lead guitar, and while they aren’t the most engaging live band, they managed to translate what is an incredibly dense, layered sound into the live setting rather well. As for Swallow the Sun, this was maybe my seventh or eighth time seeing them live now, and it was just as excellent as any of them have been (2019 was special for seeing Juha Ravio for the first time since his live hiatus). Hearing the new songs from Shining that I was obsessed with last year was a joy to behold, and they sounded heavier and more bruising than on the record (for anyone who had issues with their production). Also attending the show were Seven Spires’ Adrienne Cowan and Jack Kosto, and I got to talk to both of them outside briefly before Swallow the Sun went on. Jack was in town working on new music with Adrienne, and she told me she was leaving for the Avantasia tour the next day. I’d met both of them before, in fact Adrienne has become a common sight at specific Houston metal gigs over the past few years, but it was still surreal to look to my left during the Swallow the Sun set and see both of them standing next to us, nodding their heads along.

And that catches us up on current metal releases and events, for the most part. Anything that’s not covered in this update will be discussed on the podcast. Hopefully we get a bit of a slowdown in noteworthy releases so I can focus on some other things worth talking about on the blog, but if not, I’ll be back with one of these catch up type updates again. I’m going to deliver a singularly focused discussion on the new Avantasia and Brainstorm albums next, because both of those are worthy of a deeper look just by virtue of their veteran standing and my unabashed love for both of them. I have many thoughts!

January 3, 2025 2024, Best of, Blog related 2 Comments

The Metal Pigeon’s Best of 2024 // Part Two: The Albums

Here I go again, as David Coverdale once sagely sang, back with part two of The Metal Pigeon’s Best of 2024 feature, focusing on the best albums of the year (a tidy ten selections for you newcomers). If you missed part one of the feature a few weeks ago, focusing on the best songs of the year, be sure to check that out too. Looking back on the year in metal, I imagine we’re all going to have differing perspectives on whether or not it was a strong year for a particular subgenre or another. I’ve heard from many in our metal circle that it was a great year for black metal, and from others that it was another banner year for death metal. For my part, I was happily surprised at the renewed strength of gothic rock/metal coming through via several releases, something that I had been long hungering for over the past few years. Much like the recent folk metal revival of the past several years, there are new artists introducing freshness to gothic heaviness by putting their own spin on tried and true sounds and themes. It resulted in igniting a desire on my part to revisit a heap of classics in that vein, such as Sentenced, Charon, To/Die/For, The Man-Eating Tree, H.I.M., and many others. Much like my summer of Dio last year, it was liberating to drop out of the new music treadmill for awhile at will and just listen to older stuff I really longed to hear just for the sheer enjoyment of it. While it admittedly results in less updates here at the blog, that reconnecting with my roots keeps the metal fires burning so to speak. It reminds me of what I really love about this kind of music, and as a result, helps me sort through newer music with a more discerning and sharper ear. Well, at least I like to think so anyway, whether or not you’ll agree depends on your opinion of the list below. Read on!

10. Unleash the Archers – Phantoma

I think I might be one of the minority in feeling like Unleash the Archers stumbled onto something fresh and inspired on Phantoma. They had gone the conceptual/storyline route before, but even on the previous album Abyss where they were dabbling in a few different sounds (synths for example), they still kept tethers to the direct, USPM influenced metal attack as a nod to their past. Here they completely cut that cord, and in turn, created a sparkling, shimmering synth based soundscape for the songs on this album to flow through, the result being their most cohesive work to date — something that convincingly gelled with Phantoma’s theme of sentient AI running amok. Take the title track, ostensibly one of the heavier songs on the record, and its riffs are dressed up with glossy keyboards and layered vocals that lend themselves towards the futuristic vision the song is illustrating. This album also saw the band furthering the shift towards embracing more rock songwriting structures as opposed keeping everything metallic, a decision that has greatly shifted the weight of so many of these songs onto Brittney Hayes shoulders. This album has her finest vocal performances to date, and we discussed her career defining moment earlier on the first part of this best of feature on the epic “Give It Up Or Give It All”, but we shouldn’t ignore her impact on “The Collective” or “Buried In Code”. Her vocal choices in melody direction and inflection are undeniably addictive. I’ll admit this was a album that took time to grow on me, but I found myself yearning to hear it when I’d step away from it for awhile. It snuck its way onto this list before I realized it, but its earned its place here.

(Also appears on: The Metal Pigeon’s Best Songs of 2024)

9.  Iotunn – Kinship

Iotunn made waves a few years back with their debut Access All Worlds and its blending of progressive melodic death metal with traditional prog metal elements such as soaring clean vocals and dual lead guitar harmonies, but they really arrived on most everyone’s radar with this year’s incredible Kinship. This album was written with a degree of craftsmanship and attention to detail that underscores the album’s deliberate nature. This is illustrated in the patience of the songwriting, with most of these songs being built on long narrative arcs that culminate in emotionally powerful payoffs. It certainly was an album that required effort to immerse oneself fully, not offering up ultra hooky choruses or sugary melodies, its shifting riff sequences instead driving towards larger payoffs, much like classic Opeth albums such as Blackwater Park or Still Life. Its not an exaggeration to suggest that Kinship could be comparable to classics of that caliber, and vocalist Jón Aldará is to my ears as skillful a harsh/clean vocalist as Mikael Akerfeldt back in the day (some of you might know him from his work in Barren Earth after Mikko Kotamäki left). On such a complete and integrated album, its hard to pinpoint individual songs as standouts, but what comes to mind is the finale of “Twilight”, where after a bruising black metal tinged buildup, there’s a classic prog metal-esque riff sequence that transitions into Aldará’s earnest clean singing “Twilight / Hope flies free” over an epic melodic guitar motif echoing underneath. I debated on putting this album up higher than number nine, but because it came out relatively late in the year it received less spins than the other albums in this top ten. And lets not ignore the fact that this album is so mood dependent, and more of a full album experience (I didn’t just drop in on this thing to jam a particular song), that it had a bit of a handicap set against it terms of the amount of repeat spins it would receive. That being said, its a testament to its sheer artistic merit that it made such a monumental impact upon me in a short amount of time, that I couldn’t fathom leaving it off this list.

8.  Wolfheart – Draconian Darkness

Wolfheart delivered one of the best comebacks of the year with Draconian Darkness, bouncing back from what I felt were two lacking albums in a row. Unrelenting, punishing, bleakly sorrowful and filled with spring loaded aggression that is let loose in carefully constructed sequences, their newest effort saw Tuomas Saukkonen and company marrying their distinctly Finnish melodeath with swaths of orchestral soundscapes to amp up the grandeur and majesty. I remember spinning this on its release day in the morning not expecting much given how I felt about the aforementioned prior albums, but was left thrilled and far more awake as a result — it worked better than the little stick of instant coffee from the Korean grocery store (I take them to work, I do proper coffee at home!). Not only is the songwriting as sharp as the band’s best work on Tyhjyys and Constellation of the Black Light, but I’d argue that the gorgeous, cinematic symphonic arrangements here adorn them so well that this is in the running for my favorite Wolfheart album period. And its just a nonstop onslaught, storming the gates with the opener “Ancient Cold”, one of their hookiest songs to date, and then ratcheting up the intensity with “Evenfall” and the crushing “Burning Sky”. I love the little delicate acoustic touches that are scattered among these songs, bringing a little Gothenburg flavor to Finnish melodeath in a crossover that we need more of. And I can’t speak highly enough about the quality of the orchestrations, courtesy of Saku Moilanen, who carefully paints dark colors in the backgrounds that accentuate passages, and on occasion unfurl into gorgeous melodic motifs to carry a sequence on their own such the rising swells in “Grave”. A welcome return to the year end list for one of Finland’s greatest exports.

7.  Carmeria – Tragédie D’amour

It was when I first heard Tragédie D’amour that I began to take stock of just how much goth metal has been going through a nascent resurgence in 2024. For their sophomore album, Sydney based Carmeria decided to mix the Kamelot-ian symphonic progressive power metal heard on their 2021 debut album Advenae with a generous splash of Finnish gothic metal/rock for a heady cocktail that tastes both fresh and nostalgic. I initially appraised this album as an indulgent curiosity that fit into the Sentenced/Charon/H.I.M. kick I was going through for a couple months there, something that I would enjoy as a temporary aside, a casual aural fling. Well, that was a ridiculous notion as I soon realized, because any album that earns as many repeat listens as Tragédie D’amour has eventually comes calling when you start examining play counts, and in being honest with yourself as to what you really loved listening to the most during these past twelve months. I seem to learn that lesson anew every year and vow to never repeat it but… well here we are (I’m almost certain I’ll repeat the same mistake in 2025 at some point). Vocalist Jordan von Grae and keyboardist Mishka Bobrov were the brainchild behind injecting some of that melancholic gothic heartache into their sound as a direct homage to their shared love of H.I.M., and von Grae is a perfect melodic vocalist to blend both Roy Khan-esque dramatic theatricality with Ville Valo’s desperate, lovelorn crooning. I gushed about the album highlight “Immortal” on the Best Songs list, but this early 2000s gothic rock influence permeates much of the album, being mixed into the songwriting en masse so its not just relegated to isolated moments. Consider the ultra hooky “The Hoping Heart”, a keyboard and vocal driven song that blurs the lines of mid-tempo rocker and power ballad the way H.I.M. would with songs such as “The Funeral of Hearts” or “The Sacrament”. I also love the bands forays into pure balladry as on “Whispers of Forgiveness” with acoustic guitar and piano accompaniment that reminds me of Fourth Legacy/Karma era Kamelot; and on the short but gorgeous “Burning Ships” with bassist Emma Louise Nagy stepping in for lead vocals in a stirring performance. In listening to interviews with the band about this album, I get the feeling that maybe this marriage of goth rock into their sound was a temporary decision they made for this album, but I’d hope they would continue to pursue it. This is a sound that has been in desperate need of resurrection, and who would have thought it would take some sunbaked Aussies to bring it back to life?

(Also appears on: The Metal Pigeon’s Best Songs of 2024)

6.  Opera Magna – Heroica

Considering that I listen to K-Pop on a part time basis (its definitely not taking up as much of my listening time as it was in 2021 and 2022), you’d figure that I wouldn’t have a stumbling block with clean vocal sung metal in a foreign language. But I guess its fair to say that I have, considering this is the first non-extreme or folk metal entry by a foreign language metal album on a year end list of mine. I definitely did not think that in a year with some biggish power metal names releasing new records, that Opera Magna, relative unknowns outside of Spain, would drop the best pure symphonic power metal album of the year. I vaguely remembered hearing this band name thrown around in power metal circles around early 2000s when they were being tipped as the next Dark Moor, but I don’t think I recall actually hearing anything they did when I learned their debut album was sung in Spanish. I’m of course guilty of being close minded in retrospect, but that was a long time ago and things have changed in my ability to enjoy all forms of art in other languages (subtitles are no problem these days!). This is the band’s first genuinely new album in over a decade, considering 2023’s Of Love and Other Demons seems to be an English language version of the collection of the three Spanish language Del amor y otros demonios EPs (which are far more enjoyable in their native tongue). Their approach on Heroica takes the theatricality of Alfred Romero era Dark Moor and fuses it with the speed and technicality of influences such as Angra and Rhapsody of Fire. Songs such as “Volver” and the title track ripple with an electricity that is mood elevating and adrenaline infusing, and although the translated lyrics are quite thoughtful, its purely the sonic impact that I’m referring to here. Elsewhere, such as on “Que el amor, la vida y la muerte así te encuentren”, we get a sense of how their commitment to writing in Spanish gives their sound a unique sense of identity that perhaps the Italian power metal greats miss out on by singing in English. I can’t quite define what exactly is so appealing about the way Spanish language lyrics are phrased, perhaps its their smoothness and affinity for a grandiose delivery that I’m responding to. So even though I probably missed much of the lyrical subtext happening throughout this stellar album, I loved every second of it.

(Also appears on: The Metal Pigeon’s Best Songs of 2024)

5.  Judas Priest – Invincible Shield

At one point, this was sitting at the pole position on this list and I was certain that it wasn’t going to be dislodged from that spot. But perhaps the fact that I played the hell out of this thing upon it’s early March release date and on through the weeks and weeks thereafter made me shelve it for too long as a result (the same thing happened to Helloween’s incredible self-titled album in 2021 as I recall). I did bust this out recently in preparation for Priest’s show here in southwest Houston in October, but on the evening before the show word came down that Judas Priest was cancelling (for what we’d later find out might’ve been due to Rob getting the flu), and after that whole debacle my enthusiasm for giving it more spins faded. So yeah, I guess its fair to say that there was a tangible punishment for Invincible Shield as a whole in terms of their sliding down the year end rankings a bit, and perhaps that’s unfair, but it also has a lot to do with the competition it faced down below. I will say, in the past few weeks prepping for the finalization of this list, I have given it refresher spins and I do think its legitimately one of the best albums of the band’s career, easily their Brave New World moment in the post-reunion era (2005 and onwards). It is the strongest traditional metal album of the year as well, with Ritchie Faulkner and Glenn Tipton unleashing a dual guitar torrent that builds upon the focus and intensity of what was established on Firepower and turn it up to eleven. The album opens up with “Panic Attack” which brought to mind flashes of the Turbo album with those opening synths (happy connotations in my book) and kicks into the kind of full power attack that reminds one of “All Guns Blazing” or “Painkiller”, references I wouldn’t make unless I really believed they were apt. Then its just a murders row of absolute bangers one after another; “The Serpent and the King” (awesome), “Invincible Shield” (awesome), “Devil in Disguise” (awesome), “Gates of Hell” (awesome), “As God As My Witness” (so awesome). I skipped over “Crown of Thorns” in that sequence because it deserves special mention, featuring Halford’s most soulful vocal performance since “Angel” off Angel of Retribution, I love it so much. And things don’t dip in the second half, “Sons of Thunder” is at moments my favorite song on the record with that shouted back chorus, and “Trial By Fire” has the sort of classic mid 80s Priest-ian swagger that is so inimitable no matter how hard others have tried. I have yet to see other people’s lists, but I trust that this will be in most everyone’s top ten for obvious reasons. A late career championship for one of the greats.

4.  Myrath – Karma

No strangers to the year end best albums list (having an appearance on the 2016 edition with Legacy), Myrath returned earlier this year with their first album in over five years, no thanks to a half year delay on the release date of Karma for whatever reason (purely speculation but vinyl wait times tend to be the singular reason for any metal album delay lately). In all ways an improvement over 2019’s Shehili in which the band tried for a sound that was too heavy for its own good, they’ve seemed to realize where the sweet spot of their sound truly lies, that being the intersection between sharply written metallic hard rock with unabashed pop songwriting instincts and Maghrebian folk instrumentation. Long removed from their Symphony X influenced progressive roots, their efforts in cultivating their poppier side have culminated in what is to my ears their strongest and most cohesive album to date, even eclipsing Legacy. Central to this effort is vocalist Zaher Zorgati, whose rich tone and impressive ability to inflect and emote carries this album via some truly captivating vocal melodies which these songs are built around. The use of a small horn section (well its actually one guy, Julien Duchet, handling everything with aplomb) as a punctuating accent (particularly on “Into the Light”) really brought to mind the sound of Phil Collins solo discography, particularly given the tone of Zorgati’s vocal similarity (both singers have a character rich voice, unmistakable in their identity). The positive vibes heard there and on a song such as “Let It Go” (not a cover of the Disney super ballad in case you were suspicious!) are something that few hard rock and metal bands can pull off as convincingly as Myrath. The closest to achieve similar results would be Orphaned Land who have dabbled in writing uplifting music, but tend to skew darker and more mournful by comparison. Much of Karma’s success I attribute to Zorgati and his vocal charisma, but major credit goes to guitarist Malek Ben Arbia for maximizing a single guitar approach and as always, playing with a balance of restraint and flair when needed, as well as longtime collaborator and producer Kévin Codfert for marrying all these disparate elements so seamlessly. Easily one of the most satisfying listens of the year.

3.  Oak, Ash, & Thorn – Our Grief Is Thus

Denver’s Oak, Ash, & Thorn were one of the truly unknown bands on this list that took me by storm this past spring with the blackened folk metal of Our Grief Is Thus. They were introduced to me on an episode of the MSRcast, and described as having major Woods of Ypres vibes, which was of course enough for me to pay really close attention. After that show I binged this album nonstop, and to be sure, I do hear shades of the Canadian legends in their musical DNA, but I hear more in the way of Borknagar and Agalloch as primary influences. I will say that vocalist Adam Armstrong does sound a little like David Gold in certain moments with his clean vocals (but moreso on his very enunciative harsh vox), but I hear quite a bit of Lars Nedland in here as well. Yet what separates Oak, Ash, & Thorn from these possible influences is their songwriting, which is imbued with a personality of its own in its far looser, dare I suggest alternative rock stylistic bent. That doesn’t mean clean vocal pop choruses abound however, but the band favors a more stripped down, accessible riff sequence or rhythm pattern to usher in the choruses (they’re not buried in layers and layers of a wall of sound). The statement song here is the album opener “Dying Culture”, with one of the most artfully composed set of lyrics from any artist in 2024 and sporting a hugely memorable chorus. Yet in terms of accessibility, its hard to outdo “Light My Pyre” and “Auras”, the former being the most straight ahead rock influenced tune on the album, complete with one of the few instances of a band dropping the f-bomb in the lyrics and it feeling appropriate and warranted. But my favorite was “Auras”, with a shouting over the cliffside chorus that many a Scandinavian band would admire, Armstrong bellowing a brilliant clean vocal melody, and drummer Cierra White absolutely destroying the kit with a dynamic and engaging performance (she’s a darkhorse MVP on this album). This album got the band signed to Season of Mist, and rightfully so. Hopefully this is just the beginning of a career of masterpieces.

2.  Swallow the Sun – Shining

Arguably the most controversial album on this list, with even die hard Swallow the Sun fans being divided in opinions, it’s also perhaps the most intriguing album of the year for exactly that reason. Worn down from the exhaustive experiences writing When a Shadow Is Forced into the Light and Moonflowers, two albums dealing with grief in its various permutations, guitarist and songwriter Juha Raivio just couldn’t keep delving into the darkness any further. I loved those albums, both made my year end lists in their respective years, but they were at times too dark and sorrowful to casually listen to, so I get it. So he began a slow climb upwards, and in the process, shifted the bands sound somewhat away from the charcoal black tones of those two albums and introduced elements of light into the band’s sound, which we’ve really not heard Swallow the Sun entertain since almost a decade ago with some of the stuff off the Songs From the North triple disc outing. I say somewhat to describe this shift because there certainly still exists the band’s trademark bruising, uber heavy tones and riff sequences happening all across this album, and vocalist Mikko Kotamäki growls through plenty of it. Yet much of this album is imbued with lighter shades in guitar tones that borrow from gothic metal and dare I suggest darkwave, making use of space and textures in a way that sometimes reminds me of Steven Wilson. The producer here is Dan Lancaster, a big name in mainstream rock circles, who helped the band reimagine their sound in such a way as to emphasize atmosphere and what I’ve thought of as a de-escalation of the traditional Swallow the Sun attack. And maybe its because I’ve been in this headspace where I’ve craved that gothic metal vibe this year, but this album struck a hugely personal chord with me. It inspired a pensive and thoughtful atmosphere, a slowing down of scattered thoughts into a purely singular focus, an incredible achievement for any album. It was an intense and heavy album that was also meditative, and that utterly surreal strangeness captivated me.

(Also appears on: The Metal Pigeon’s Best Songs of 2024)

1.  Unto Others – Never, Neverland

Six years ago, when they were known as Idle Hands before US trademark law forced their name change, vocalist/guitarist Gabriel Franco, lead guitarist Sebastian Silva, and drummer Colin Vranizan crashed onto the 2019 best albums list at a staggering number two with their debut Mana, and instantaneously became a band that I’d keep at the forefront of my attention for future releases and shows. I caught them live sometime in 2021 on their headlining Strength tour and although I have mixed feelings on that album now (too heavy for its own good), the show here in Houston was fierce, with precision performances, and an intensity onstage from everyone involved that only bands who’ve really gelled together can muster. I left that show thinking with some degree of certainty that their best work was ahead of them, but I don’t think I ever suspected it would be right around the corner on their next frigging album. That is exactly what Never, Neverland could be (but if we’re lucky, its only just the start), because this album — a wild kitchen sink collection of gothic rock, traditional heavy metal, post-punk, and even some new wave strained through a Sisters of Mercy t-shirt — is the complete encapsulation of everything weird and wonderful about Unto Others. The band is an open book emotionally, at times expressing themselves with detached irony, at other times with tongue-in-cheek silliness, and often, with a disarming earnestness that cuts deep.

The songs that illustrate those emotional perspectives are just perfect in their simplicity, even downright elegant in moments, as on the album opener “Butterfly”, where Franco metaphorically examines the fine line between desire and destruction in regards to something or someone beautiful. Similarly on “Fame”, he delivers his wry observations of the trappings of stardom and success, singing in a icily detached tone (he’s so goddamned good at that) “The beauty often fades / And people hate when people change”. But without warning, Unto Others pulls me deep into nostalgia with something like “Momma Likes the Door Closed”, where I’m reminded of listening to stuff like Green Jelly and Primus in a friend’s bedroom on summer vacation from middle school, where you just nod along to a scorching riff and grin foolishly because you know its stupid but you love it anyway. And I get Faith No More vibes from the not quite instrumental “Hoops”, with its inexplicable, nonsensical shouted lyrics alongside awesome lead guitar parts, where its all so excellent even though you’re wondering why this was turned into a song in the first place. The beating heart of the album resides in its most vulnerable moments however, where on “Suicide Today” Franco disguises pleading urgency behind wryly glib, off-handedly conversational lyrics. Or on “Time Goes On”, where through a beautifully arranged guitar motif Franco sings about the dangers of being stuck in one’s own memories of the past, figuratively shouting (“Hey!”) to wake us from our stupor. The studio version of their “Pet Sematary” cover here that they actually played at the aforementioned Houston gig feels like a Christmas present by the time the album concludes. Captivating from start to finish, Never, Neverland made me run the gamut of emotions, kept me guessing, and had me playing the album in repeat mode on Spotify for countless weeks on end. Truly the album of the year.

December 25, 2024 2024, Best of Post a Comment

The Metal Pigeon’s Best of 2024 // Part One: The Songs

Another year nearly done, and another look back at the metal that served as its soundtrack, this list being part one of a two-part Best of 2024 feature, focusing first on what are the ten best songs of the year to my ears. One of the things I’ve come to accept over the many years that I’ve been writing and publishing year end metal lists is that I rarely overlap with the general consensus. Blood Incantation for instance, is nowhere to be found on my lists, though I acknowledge their unorthodox brilliance and I get why so many love what they’re doing. A long time ago I used to think that in being so very far apart from the general consensus, I was missing out on a collective experience that the rest of the metal community was having, and that it was a fault of mine.

I’ve come to let go of that hang up as time has passed, and have embraced being out here in left field with a handful of other metal obsessives whose lists I eagerly await. I wish more people would offer up best songs lists in addition to their album lists, because I feel that in picking out individual songs worthy of the spotlight, you get an even bigger window into not only someone’s musical tastes, but their personality as well. Enough of the soap box for now, I hope everyone finds something about the songs below to love as much as I did, and I did make one concession towards looking like other lists — I’ve finally decided to number them in descending order (I’ve been a curmudgeon on this, but I’ll grudgingly admit there’s a logic to doing it).

10.   Fellowship – “Victim” (from the album The Skies Above Eternity)

The most recent of all the entries on this list, being a late November release, “Victim” is simply that undeniable of a power metal song. Its constructed in what is now trademark Fellowship fashion, where they pull you in with cheerful, major key sugariness only to gut punch you with some pretty emotionally loaded lyrics. Vocalist Matthew Corry has been a revelation for the power metal scene in this regard, bringing a literate pen and more thoughtful consciousness to his voice as a lyricist. He seems to possess an innate understanding of how to craft a lyrical phrase that cuts straight to the heart in a poetic, yet direct manner, as he demonstrates here when he asks in the refrain “Will I always feel like a victim? / Will I always fight on my own?” Its this album’s answer to “Glint”, the now power metal classic off their debut EP that rocketed them to collective power metal consciousness. Both songs speak about some facet of mental health, barely concealed with fantastical metaphors and imagery, which sets Fellowship apart from other power metal bands where that kind of interpretation is solely left to the listener to decide.

9.   Suidakra – “Unraveling Destinies” (from the album Darkanarad)

Striking like a coiled serpent, Suidakra exploded on their new album Darkanarad with a classic melodic death metal attack that they haven’t had since the days of Emprise to Avalon and Signs For the Fallen. Emblematic of this return to their melodeath roots is the single “Unraveling Destinies”, as catchy and instantaneous a song Suidakra has ever penned, with the introductory riff motif being hooky as all get out. Part of this song’s charm is the unorthodox structural arrangment happening here, such as the complete drop out save for some tight riffing and cymbal work in lieu of second verse stanza — then where you’d expect a chorus, we get another drop out with insistent riffing and an abrupt change of pace clean vocal led passage. When you step back and consider just how bizarre this song’s pacing is, its even more impressive that it is so beautifully harmonious and unforgettable. Arkadius’ approach to riffs has always been a defining feature of this band’s appeal, at once bleak and punishing yet also vividly colorful and resonant. No more is that evident than during the sequence at the 3:40 mark, where riff intensity and layered harmonies create magic that fades far too quickly.

8.   Carmeria – “Immortal” (from the album Tragédie D’amour)

I was already digging Tragédie D’amour during my first listen thru before hearing “Immortal”, sitting far back at number seven on the track listing when this absolute goth metal diamond shined forth its glorious light and entranced me (picture the heart eyes emoji). I was already in the full blown swing of a heavy goth mood where for a few weeks I was constantly spinning Charon, Sentenced, and H.I.M.’s entire catalogs when the ever reliable Josh of Heavy Debriefings pointed out Carmeria to me. He sold the recommendation by saying that they had just put out the perfect 00s Finnish goth metal album, despite their Australian passports, and damn he wasn’t exaggerating. I love this stuff, and I know I know — the bright, euphoric hook here has more in common with the sweet gothic hard rock ear candy of H.I.M. than their more abrasive, harder edged countrymen mentioned above. Hey, I’m unabashed these days about my admiration for Ville Valo as a songwriter and vocalist, and Carmeria distilled the essence of everything that was great about that sound into one of the most earwormy singles of the year.

7.   Tribulation – “Hungry Waters” (from the album Sub Rosa In Æternum)

Tribulation’s new album is one of the strangest yet ultimately most compelling that 2024 had to offer, if not exactly the most surprising. This band was telegraphing moving further away from their black metal roots on their past two albums, so while the gothic metal they’re exploring throughout Sub Rosa In Æternum was expected, its surreal to hear just how incredibly well they’re pulling it off. The standout example of this success is “Hungry Waters”, as convincing a Sisters of Mercy-esque clean vocal driven song that these guys could have dreamed up. I love that drum roll intro right into that sparse guitar lick that fills the space over smoothly rolling bass, while Johannes Andersson croons in a Nick Cave meets Johnny Cash amalgam that doesn’t sound like a pastiche. The band’s usage of space as a instrument unto itself is gorgeous, particularly in the sequence after the guitar solos, where lesser bands would fumble such an atmospheric sequence and lose our attention as listeners. There was never a danger of that throughout this tune, a song so entrancing that it still is the first thing I listen to when revisiting this album. Yet another example of why gothic metal reigned supreme over everything else this year.

6.   Unleash the Archers – “Give It Up Or Give It All” (from the album Phantoma)

A transcendent moment on Unleash the Archers concept album Phantoma, this was the anthemic, arena rock resonating chorus that stuck in my head after every pass through the album. This song makes this list not just because its an expertly written mid-tempo, arms outstretched quasi power ballad epic, but because even in a career filled with no shortage of powerful grit and full throated, lung obliterating screams, this is Brittney Hayes singular greatest vocal performance to date. Of course she is jaw dropping on the magnificent chorus here, ringing with shades of Roxette’s Marie Fredriksson in her tone and delivery, at once smooth but absolutely reverberating with power. But I’m just as gripped by her performance during the verses, with her choices in vocal melody and lyrical pacing the kind of stuff that you’d normally hear coming from greats such as Mutt Lange and Desmond Child. I really enjoyed a ton of Phantoma whereas it was met with a bit of a collective head scratch from the power metal community as a whole, and maybe I’m in the minority in saying this, but I’m entirely down for them to do more stuff in this vein instead of trying to out heavy their older albums.

5.   Opera Magna – “Volver” (from the album Heroica)

This magnificent song was the magnum opus from Opera Magna’s Heroica, and the first instance on this blog’s best songs of the year lists to be a Spanish language track (I don’t know what took so long but I blame only myself!). I’m not entirely up on my Spanish despite years of taking it in high school, but unless I’m mistaken “Volver” means “return”, and that makes sense in context of the scenes in the music video above, but I didn’t need the visuals of the MV to put imagery into my head while listening to this spectacularly inspiring gem. There’s so much to praise here, but lets start with the soaring vocals of Jose Vicente Broseta, whose voice is so phenomenally powerful and soaring that I wonder why I haven’t heard him in some guest spots around the power metal landscape (oh wait, actually he has a laundry list of guest appearances, but they’re all for Spanish metal bands). The composition and arrangement of the symphonic elements here is, dare I suggest, on another tier above much of the rest of symphonic power metal, with an ear towards understated refinement, eschewing Hollywood soundtrack histrionics. A lesson in elegance.

4.   Swallow the Sun – “What I Have Become” (from the album Shining)

Emblematic of what I respect and love about Swallow the Sun’s recent new album Shining, “What I Have Become” is one of the strangest hopeful songs I could possibly imagine, and it wasn’t even anywhere close to being my favorite cut off the album initially. But as I stuck with the album through repeated listens in order to try to decipher its unorthodox mixing of Swallow the Sun’s patented gritty death doom with a glossy, sparkling production finish, this song began to emerge as one that lingered with me long after the album had finished. There’s something hypnotizing about this song for me that I’m not sure I can quite verbalize, but it must have something to do with vocalist Mikko Kotamäki’s split personalities happening simultaneously. He sings a graceful melody in a wistfully hopeful major key, while shadowing it with that inimitable hellish screaming vocal, with the two being layered together towards the end for a particularly unsettling effect. I never knew how to feel exactly after listening to this song, but that mystery is what kept me coming back.

3.   Saltatio Mortis w/ Blind Guardian – “Finsterwacht”

I didn’t know who Saltatio Mortis were before this collaboration with Blind Guardian (in the form of co-lead vocals by Hansi Kursch and presumably some guitar parts by Andre or Marcus (no one seems to know for sure…), but they grabbed my attention this year with the release of the single “Finsterwacht”. The song is in German, marking one of the rare instances where you can hear Hansi sing in his native tongue (he previously did so on a guest appearance on In Extremo’s “Roter Stern”), but it’s stormy, grandiose, and epic arrangement and songwriting transcend language barriers. Saltatio Mortis have made a name for themselves lately for penning music inspired by videogames and general nerdery, and “Finsterwacht” tells a story about the events in the German version of Dungeons and Dragons, Das Schwarze Auge (“The Dark Eye”). The construction of this song lives up to the pedigree of their esteemed guests in Blind Guardian, finding a way to merge driving, surging build-ups with gloriously triumphant, exuberant payoffs in the refrain, and a highly memorable bagpipe motif that serves as the frequent segue glue. They released an English version of this later on during the year, complete with Hansi’s participation, and that was cool, but the magic resides in the original German version, one of the surprise gifts of 2024.

2.   DreamGate – “Dreamgate” (from the album Dreamgate)

Power metal flagbearer Johannes Skyblazer (of the band Skyblazer) introduced me to this song with an impassioned recommendation on Facebook, declaring of the song, “You want to know what happiness sounds like for me? Check out the song Dreamgate, by Dreamgate off their album Dreamgate. That chorus progression will ALWAYS do it for me more than anything ever will.” And yes, its somewhat of a metal tradition to have a eponymous song off their eponymous album, Iron Maiden did it after all, but somehow its funnier to me when Dreamgate’s doing it. That’s not a slight in any way I should emphasize, because I love this song, and I love this album, and I love the band. Hailing from Italy, they’re very new on the power metal scene, but possess an old school, early 2000s stylistic aesthetic — and it all makes sense that Johannes, who is one of the biggest Power Quest fans in the world, would be the one to recommend this song to everyone. It is unabashedly cheerful, hopeful in tone, and yes that progression in the chorus is indeed everything myself and any other fan of the cheerier end of power metal could ever want. Its the kind of thing that can instantly lift your mood, stave away depression, or help you celebrate a tiny victory of some sort. It was my most listened to song of 2024 for all those reasons and more.

1.   Unto Others – “Suicide Today” (from the album Never, Neverland)

I never imagined a song could be at once equal parts sardonic and encouraging, hopeful even, but the dudes in Unto Others (America’s greatest goth metal export since Type O’ Negative) managed to birth such a creation with “Suicide Today”, the standout single from Never, Neverland. Immediate, infectious, and thrilling, this song ignites mere seconds in to pop off like a rocket, with lead guitarist Sebastian Silva delivering perhaps his most energetic riff progression to date, and an earworm to boot. And while Silva, bassist Brandon Hill and drummer Colin Vranizan lay down the firepower, guitarist and vocalist Gabriel Franco sings in his charismatically deadpan vocal, “You don’t gotta be suicidal / Don’t have to kill yourself today / No, you can do it tomorrow”. I’m sure it elicited a guffaw from all of us the first time we heard it, but he’s specifically directing it at a litany of distraught characters he describes with succinct word pictures during the verses, so its not just a throwaway lyric to fill a syllabic need. He leaves off by saying “And you’re gonna die anyways / So give it a day”, and its such a wryly worded bit of motivation without sounding schlockily… erm, motivating. Its a brilliant, unforgettable song that walks the thin line between heart on sleeve emotion and dark humor the same way goth metal masters such as Sentenced and the aforementioned Type O were interweaving both throughout their own music. A career defining moment for the new heirs to the goth throne.

November 13, 2024 2024, Nightwish, symphonic metal, Tuomas Holopainen Post a Comment

Deja Vu: Nightwish’s Yesterwynde

Although I’ve largely avoided writing reviews this year, it was difficult to keep quiet about a new Nightwish album, because obviously they are a seminal band in symphonic metal, but also because they at one point delivered a legitimate album of the year in 2011 for Imaginaerum (in my revisionist, corrected list that is). Yet as opposed to just immediately writing an album review for Yesterwynde like everyone else, I wanted to let this thing digest for a bit internally, and for the dust to settle around it’s release as well. I’ve read scattered opinions on this album, the band’s first without bassist/co-vocalist Marco Hietala since 2001’s Wishmaster (which sounds unreal but yeah, its true), and have felt that a consensus has begun to emerge that largely centers on indifference from most. Yes the Nightwish faithful are still attenuated to Tuomas Holopainen’s lyrics here in a way that few other metal bands experience, but I was admittedly a little bit surprised at just how quickly this new album was listened to, commented on, and dismissed by the symphonic and power metal communities at large.

For all the criticism 2020’s Human. :||: Nature. received, it was the subject of furious discussion for weeks on end when it was released — granted we were all of us sitting at home because of the pandemic and had nothing but time on our hands, but I remember there being real agitation and annoyance at that album’s indulgences, at its underuse of Floor Jansen’s talent, its marginalization of Marco Hietala’s vocals, and its opulent instrumental second disc that gave new meaning to the term pretentious. But in the now month and a half that’s passed since Yesterwynde’s release, I’ve not seen the same amount of discussion about it anywhere really. The posts on various metal subreddits about the album aren’t tracking in the hundreds of comments a Nightwish album usually garners, the album got a cursory discussion in the r/PowerMetal discord, and I don’t recall anyone on Facebook or Twitter or Threads discussing it at length. I’ve come to sense that maybe, and this is just my admittedly singular perspective… most of the people out there that would have had an interest in Nightwish’s work previously have little to say this time around. So why the general indifference? Why not the tidal back and forth of opinions between those who find Nightwish can’t do much wrong versus those who think Tuomas has his head up you know where?

So I think the obvious culprit would be the music itself, which I will say off the bat is certainly an improvement over Human. :||: Nature (I really resent the punctuation in that album’s title). Wisely selected singles such as “Perfume of the Timeless” and “An Ocean of Strange Islands” are indeed made of the same ingredients that formulated so much vintage Nightwish of yore, though criticisms against their mixing are hugely warranted. Floor’s vocals were intentionally mixed lower on this album as an artistic decision, for what purpose I’m not entirely sure however. If you go on YouTube and search up “Perfume of the Timeless” remixed, a fan has uploaded a version where he boosted her vocals and lo and behold, it sounds dramatically more powerful than the album version, entirely more thrilling and Nightwish-y, but I digress. The other single, “The Day Of…” is less convincing however, and the more I’ve listened to it’s clunky mess of children’s choirs (a musical element Tuomas has overused by this point) and orchestral passages where the band practically disappears, the more I’m convinced this might be the second worst Nightwish single to date. If you’re wondering, “Noise” is easily the first in that ranking… they should do everything in their power to not promote something that dastardly again.

Stepping away from the singles, I actually found that I enjoyed part of “Sway” and much of the orchestral ballad “Lanternlight”, with the former being a close cousin to the twee Rusted Root vibes of “Harvest” on the previous album. I love the first few minute and a half of “Sway” in particular, with it being one of the few examples where I really feel that Troy had to have a lead vocal part, his gentle tone a perfect match for the hushed whisper the vocal melody is delivered in. It all gets a little messy during the middle sequence where they’re talking in grandiose tones about “the big reveal”… can we get back to the ballad please? Well they never do and the song dissolves into orchestral nothingness and four minutes feels like six and this is an opportunity wasted. On “Lanternlight”, I felt we got the closest to the Nightwish of olde, with Tuomas penning a heart on sleeve, lead vocal driven ballad that Floor genuinely shines on as a singer, her best moment on these past two albums. I think it works because it is so simple, the melody is allowed to flow unobstructed by any other elements jutting in unwelcomingly. As for everything else… well, “The Children of ‘Ata” had a solid chorus, an admirable lyrical sentiment that covered an interesting historical tidbit I had remembered reading about before, but that was it for positive takeaways.

I wrote in my review for Human. :||: Nature that Tuomas was “at his best when he allows himself to write in a pop songwriter mode first and foremost, and then colors in the details with metallic elements, with film soundtrack music, and with ancillary elements like the aforementioned tribal drumming or folk music”. All the progressive rock infusions that have swirled into the mix on these last two albums are pulling him away from his strength, and I think that no one is around to tell him as much (he certainly won’t discern this himself… this is what happens when others start calling you maestro and you don’t correct them). The first Floor album, Endless Forms Most Beautiful, worked really well because he essentially wrote simple, straightforward symphonic metal songs that were built on hooks and free flowing melodies. I remember remarking that it sounded at times like a throwback to Oceanborn, with a slight power metal tinge to it, and the lyrical theme of that album was the first dip into this pool of humanism and nature. It really worked. The thing that I ultimately came away with while listening to Yesterwynde was that Endless Forms aged really well, its directness very reminiscent of the sharpness of the band that wrote Imaginaerum, and that everything since has been a chore to sit and listen thru. I do think Marco’s missing vocal presence could have gone a long way in addressing that, the idea being that his voice almost demanded something more straightforwardly metal or more meat and potatoes so to speak, and with just Floor and Troy on vocals, there is a lack of this needed driving force.

I also wonder if the overwhelming indifference I’ve detected to this albums release is also a reaction to this being the third record in a row mining this particular subject matter. I know I’ve used the Green Day analogy before, that American Idiot was a fresh concept when it came out, but that same concept felt trite and overdone when they went with it again five years later on 21st Century Breakdown. Nightwish has described this as being the third and final album in a trilogy, so the good news here is that this particular vein should be exhausted by their own admission, that we can expect something new. In the process of preparing to write about this album, I listened to the previous albums in this trilogy back to back before listening to this one, and despite the quality gap between those two albums, the thing they share in common with Yesterwynde is that some of these songs are interchangeable from album to album. Something like “Sway” or “Harvest” could’ve been on any of these three albums, same for some of the other tracks, and so it calls into question the need for a trilogy — all are “positive” in tone, which has been the key talking point in the press interviews the band has given this time around. What was so different from album to album here that necessitated three albums worth of music digging into the same of inspiration that wasn’t already said on Endless Forms?

That lingering question is ultimately what Nightwish fans should be worried about. Did Tuomas extend this theme for so long because he’s at a loss of what to do otherwise? And now that its over, where does he go from here as a songwriter for this band? The standard advice he’d likely get from most critics is to return to something more personal and cut from the same cloth the older Nightwish classics were, but is that possible? Those albums were written from starkly personal places that fans love to speculate about (I will refrain here), and he’s older and at a different phase in his life. We’ve also seen less than stellar results when some other artists have attempted such a challenge, with the results being watered down or unconvincing. Its ironic that the older, more personal songs about longing and heartbreak and inner turmoil were more universally loved and adored than these songs addressing more universal, grander themes that should be applicable to all of us. But that’s an adage that has been around in all types of media, that audiences will respond to something they can identify with. Its why people love to talk about their favorite characters in movies, and not so much their favorite thematic material. I don’t have any answers for this lingering question, but I’ll be extremely interested in how Tuomas answers it.

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