Judas Priest

Vicious Rumors – Razorback Killers Review

By Steel Druhm on March 23, 2011 in 2011, 4.0, American Metal, Heavy Metal, Reviews, SPV, Heavy Metal, 1 comment

2011 is turning out to be a great year for metal thus far. I find myself giving out 4.0 and 4.5 left and right and there’s lots of new stuff I’m really enjoying. With all due modesty, I caused this to happen by predicting the new Belphegor would be one of my top picks unless we had a truly banner year in metal. Well, you can thank your beloved Steel Druhm for the self-jinx by sending him all the finest ales, meats and cheeses from across the lands. Moving on, we come to another surprisingly good release, this time by long running San Francisco vets Vicious Rumors. These chaps have been knocking around since 1979 and put out some great albums early in their career like their self-titled opus and Welcome to the Ball (their debut even featured mega guitar ace Vinnie Moore). After the tragic death of vocalist Carl Albert in 1995, there was a long dry spell of lackluster and mediocre albums and not until 2006’s Warball did they truly get back into vintage fighting shape again. After a lengthy wait, they finally return with Razorback Killers and once again show themselves capable of much ass kickery and name takery.

Jag Panzer – The Scourge of the Light Review

By Steel Druhm on February 28, 2011 in 2011, 4.5, American Metal, Heavy Metal, Power Metal, Reviews, SPV, Heavy Metal, Power Metal, 0 comments

Jag Panzer has been an American metal institution since the early 80’s and they’ve always been a band that you could rely on to clobber you with enormous, powerful, top-notch heavy metal of the traditional school. They’re also the original American power metal act. Their take on power metal being far different than the textbook European approach, Jag Panzer were always much heavier, tougher and had more balls than the Helloweens, Gamma Rays and such of the Euro-school. Built around the mammoth, masculine and powerhouse vocals of Harry “the Tyrant” Conklin, the Panzer sound was always hard-edged, large and much closer to the NWOBHM style of Iron Maiden or Judas Priest. After a wait of nearly seven years since 2004’s Casting the Stones, The Panzer finally rolls again and we get album eight (nine if you count the long shelved Chain of Command opus), The Scourge of the Light. Was it worth the long wait? Does Moonsorrow piss in the snow? [Was the Pope a Nazi? – AMG] Of course it was worth it! Scourge is a welcome and mighty return to the metal throne by Jag Panzer and they brings us ten new slices of old school metal glory.

Ghost – Opus Eponymous Review

By Steel Druhm on January 3, 2011 in 2010, 4.5, Heavy Metal, Metal Blade, Reviews, Rise Above Records, Swedish Metal, Heavy Metal, 15 comments

How can this be? Yet another metal treasure nearly escaped the watchful eye of Steel Druhm and makes me feel shame for failing to include it in my Top Ten(ish) of 2010. Please forgive this epic oversight as I belatedly introduce you to Opus Eponymous, the debut by Sweden’s Ghost, which is a goldmine of expertly written and played mega-retro 70’s style satanic heavy metal. Taking inspiration from old Mercyful Fate, Witchfinder General, Pentagram and every horror film about satanic cults ever made, Ghost operate in a time warp where metal was as much about mood as sheer musical heaviness and where melody and accessibility were king. Opus Eponymous sometimes feels like the soundtrack to The Exorcist and at other times like Anton LaVey’s satanic mass set to music but it’s compelling, instantly likable and a lot of evil rocking fun for those among us in the left lane of the highway to hell.

Halford – Made of Metal Review

By Steel Druhm on October 11, 2010 in 2.0, 2010, Heavy Metal, Metal God Records, Heavy Metal, 5 comments

This will come as an unwelcome surprise to Angry Metal folks everywhere, but the new Halford album Made of Metal isn’t angry and is only partly made of metal. Despite the deceptive title, Halford’s third solo album is a diverse but confusing mix of awkward, mostly flawed metal anthems, cheesy love songs with a metallic edge and poppy bubble gum metal/rock. Amid this confusion, only a few quality metal moments can be found. With all due respect to one of the founding fathers of heavy metal and a living legend to many (myself included), the results here are wildly inconsistent and just flat out disappointing.

Accept – Blood of Nations Review

By Steel Druhm on September 8, 2010 in 2010, 4.5, Nuclear Blast, Power Metal, Reviews, Thrash Metal, 10 comments

And “THEY’RE BACK!! The teutonic terrors responsible for such classic metal albums as Breaker, Restless and Wild, Balls to the Wall have reformed to deliver one humdinger of a comeback ass whipping and one of the best metal albums of 2010 in the process. Blood of Nations is the first slab of new Accept material since 1996’s Predator and to say they are back with a vengeance is quite an understatement indeed. Yes, it’s sad but true, original and uber distinctive frontman Udo Dirkschneider is not onboard for this reunion crusade, but fear not, Accept manages quite nicely without his unique services and no one is more surprised than yours truly about that one.

Stormzone – Death Dealer Review

By Steel Druhm on May 20, 2010 in Reviews, NWOBHM, 4 comments

Neal Kay, for those who don’t know, is widely credited with discovering and championing Iron Maiden way back in the day. Well, if that wasn’t service enough to the metal world, now he has helped bring us Northern Ireland’s classic metal masters Stormzone and their new album Death Dealer. This is no small accomplishment because, quite simply, this album is an absolute masterpiece of classic metal and full to the brim with top quality metal anthems. Stormzone is a band deeply entrenched in the early NWOBHM style and composed of musicians like vocalist John “Harv” Harbinson, with ties to bands of that era (Sweet Savage, Fastway). All the trappings of the British metal invasion are here and fans of that sound and seminal masters like of Saxon and Grim Reaper will immediately hear it in the sound and attitude exhibited on Death Dealer.

Skyforger – Kurbads Review

By Angry Metal Guy on April 24, 2010 in 2010, 4.0, Black Metal, Folk Metal, Metal Blade, Reviews, Folk Metal, 1 comment

Skyforger is Latvia’s answer to folk metal and they’ve been giving it a go for quite a while. Despite having been around since 1995, however, they’ve not produced a terribly huge discography. In fact, Kurbads is the first Skyforger album since 2003, when they self-released a folk album that was mightily well-received by their fanbase, even, apparently, more so their metal album from the same year Thunderforge. The band, for the record, has also been involved in a bit of controversy surrounding the use of, what the band calls a thundercross, and what the rest of us call a swastika in their logo. But it seems the band has worked very hard to distance themselves from any of the controversy surrounding this and should be approached from a non-political stance.

White Wizzard – Over the Top Review

By Angry Metal Guy on February 16, 2010 in 2010, 3.0, American Metal, Earache Records, Power Metal, Reviews, Thrash Metal, Heavy Metal, NWOBHM, 0 comments

There is an interesting irony to throwback bands like White Wizzard and a lot of the other thrash throwbacks that are coming out right now, which is that at one point in time what these guys were doing was forward thinking. I know it’s hard to believe, in a world where metal is used to support stupid ideologies, backwards thinking or just generally brutish and retarded behavior, it’s hard to think of metal as progressive, but in 1980, metal was outside of the box. Bands like Iron Maiden and Def Leppard were just cutting their teeth, Lars Ulrich was busy stealing their riffs and ideas and heavy metal was fresh, young, innovative and above all rebellious and really, really interesting.

Charred Walls of the Damned – Charred Walls of the Damned Review

By Angry Metal Guy on January 23, 2010 in 2010, 3.0, American Metal, Metal Blade, Reviews, Heavy Metal, Power Metal, 0 comments

Charred Walls of the Damned has two distinct honors from the get-go: not only is it the longest band name EVER, but it’s also the first thing in which excellent drummer Richard Christy has surfaced in since going to the Howard Stern show and leaving American power metallers Iced Earth in the dust. I think everyone was wondering when he was going to jump back into metal, myself included. It’s hard to imagine that the former Death and Iced Earth drummer was just going to leave everything behind. Given his background it was only a matter of time. And not just his background: homeboy has contacts, too! He brings with him the mighty Jason Suecof, mostly known for his production (Trivium, Luna Mortis, God Forbid and so on), but who is also a fucking wicked ass guitar player (seriously, dude can shred). On bass, of course, is the mighty Steve DiGiorgio who played with Christy in Iced Earth and Death. How can this project possibly lose?