ReVamp is the solo project of former After Forever vocalist Floor Jansen (currently the interim vocalist of Nightwish) so you can expect the opera-metal styling's of her previous band but also she has a much wider range of influences, opener Here's My Hell is the track most like After Forever as it has the huge orchestral keys, heavy riffs and features some guest growls from George Oosthoek. Sweet Curse is a piano ballad that sounds like Evanescence and features Symphony X's Russell Allen on vocals; there is a technical metal feel to Distain which features Speed from Soilwork on co-vocals. The album is full of strong symphonic metal that is only right considering the musicians Jansen has drafted in to help all of the guitars (lead, rhythm and bass) are handled by Waldemar Sorychta who brings the thrashy riffage to the heavier end and also the acoustic strumming of the slower tracks, the drums come from Koen Herfst who blast beats his way through the album, the major contributor however is After Forever keyboardist Joost van der Broek who brings the pounding synths, keys, pianos, programming as well as being the producer, engineer, mixer and arranger of the classical quartet that supports them on the majority of the tracks. the album moves between fast paced melodic symphonic metal and slower ballads featuring Jansen's superb vocals, and do believe me along with Amanda Somerville and Simone Simmons, Jansen is one of the best vocalists in metal having a strong powerful mid and a huge mezzo-soprano high. This is a good album for fans of female fronted symphonic metal however if you don't like the genre then you won't get much out of it. 7/10
Powerwolf: Bible Of The Beast (2009)
Powerwolf are a German power metal band that are a major juxtaposition as they play upbeat power metal full of galloping bass and drums, bombastic keys, shredding guitars and strong vocals, however they also wear corpse paint have Gothic overtones and pretend to be Werewolves. Imagine Sabaton if they sang about Satan instead of war. Powerwolf are a good band and come from the Helloween school of speedy, OTT, metal that also has some seriously melodic keys, after the scene setting intro, Raise Your Fist Evangelist has a Latin spouting intro before a chunky riff gets things going backed by a Gothic organ. The guitars are dirty and match frontman Attila Dorn's strong, almost operatic, vocals that do sound a lot like Joakim Broden from Sabaton, things then move into the hammer (and sickle) pounding rhythm of Moscow After Dark. As you can probably tell the band don't take themselves very seriously with titles like Catholic In The Morning...Satanist At Night, Panic In The Pentagram and the very silly Resurrection By Erection. This is a silly, well performed, darkened power metal that has some great playing and also big hooky sing along power metal anthems. 7/10
Painside: Dark World Burden (2010)
I will be honest I had never heard of Painside and I bought this album on a bit of a whim, well I'm glad I did as this is a great album, full of proper heavy metal that bridges the gap between traditional heavy metal and thrash. Painside are from Brazil but sound like latter period Judas Priest full of heavy thrash-like riffage and some killer soloing. The band have heavy pounding modern metal in tracks like Where Darkness Rules, bass led Iron Maiden style metal on Collapse The Lies which even has the whoah's in the centre. What strikes you about this debut is that the songs are really strong, the riffs of Carlos Eduardo Saione snarl like caged animals and the solos of Eduardo Fernandez melt the fret board (see The Deviant) the drums destroy, the bass rumbles and the vocals are excellent equally adept at crooning and some helium filled high notes that in places sound like Rob Halford and in others sounds like Bruce Dickinson/Tobias Sammet kudos to singer Guilherme Sevens for being able to effectively move between these two greats. It's not all metal bluster though as This Dark World shows with its acoustic intro and massive bridge before speeding up into the heavy middle section again full of fret wankery. This is simply stunning album that I have played repeatedly it is the perfect mix of, classic and modern metal with tracks that sound like Maiden/Priest and others that bring to mind the more aggressive styling’s of LOG (Serpents Tongue). Like I said a great metal album that sums up everything that is awesome about metal and any album that ends with a duet featuring Chris Boltendahl from Grave Digger is ok in my book. Seek out this album! 9/10
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