2006-09-02
There's no mistaking an old school melodic metal album when you it looks like this, a crowed of long haired metal-heads serving as a crowed for a mythological figure descending from the sky, and with a title like "Minions Of Metal" you know you're safely in 80's area metal for sure.
Actually, there's another dead give-away, the band vocalist's name is Oliva, and their snail address is Caffery Ave.
Savatage, anyone?
The real surprise for me with this album, was just how accomplished, well played and well produced was it; many retro metal albums tend to sound as if recorded with an old tape cassette, this is actually well produced and clear, while still sounding like an 80's power metal album. Another regular failing in most such albums, is the vocalist, no such problem here, Mr. Oliva has a fine melodic voice with a good aggressive edge.
The obvious similarities are there,
Iron Maiden (on "Eternal Void"), Old Savatage (mostly "Sirens" area), and of course, some
Manowar (on "Let The Blood Run Red", also featuring legendary vocalist Thor), though the lyrics are the expected metal clichés, it just works, something clicks and it all comes out as a very good album that would have sounded well at home in the mid-80's.
Stand-out tracks are the opener ("Minions Of Metal"), "Lake Of Time", that uses a great, aggressive riff, the half-acoustic "Stranger In The Sky", and the heavy "Road To Glory", but all-in-all, there's no weak track here whatsoever, just a great metal album.
Alon Miasnikov
