Blood of the Saints

German power metal/freak show act Powerwolf have been perplexing me since their 2005 debut. All corpse painted up and evil looking, they look like a black metal band but actually play sub-par power metal with traditional metal elements and coat the whole thing with cheesy theatrics and goofball pomp. I attempted to get into what they were doing on several occasions due to the buzz they were receiving but aside from a few scattered tracks, it was rough going. To me they always seemed generic and silly, though I appreciated their zest and zeal for entertaining. With this back-history, I naturally chose to approach their fourth album, Blood of the Saints with muted expectations. As usual, Steel Druhm is proven wise indeed. Blood of the Saints is arguably Powerwolf’s best release thus far and packs several amusing and respectable songs, albeit, still laden with cheese and cheap theatrics. However, as a whole, its still the same Powerwolf product and that can’t lead too far down the road to the land of 5.0. For every decent song, there’s an equally painful one and a few are just laughable. While I know they don’t take themselves too seriously, sometimes silly is too silly and that’s the case here more often than not.