‘Aftershocks Of Death’ has a great intro very reminiscent of Diamond Head’s ‘Am I Evil’, some solid drumming kicks this opening track along at a nice pace and some pretty awesome riffing going on there too.

Wonderous old school thrash rhythms punctuate ‘The Headless Horseman’, i have also got used to the Roddy Stone style vocals in fact this could be a Viking Skull song!!!!

‘Stalker’ kicks off with some nice bass work before launching into a doom paced rocker with the riffs coming at you at such a rate you cant sit still for a second.

‘Hypnotise’ pounds like a battering ram (Judas Priest pun intended), classic british heavy metal nuff said!
Now ‘The Lycan’ is a fucking great song, but the vocal is a little strained at times, sounds like the singer is trying to sing too high and it does kill it a bit.

An epic 8 minutes of superb music starting with some great acoustic guitar then heading off into pounding riffage and gutteral vocals.At times ‘Rites Of Passage’ threatens to move well and truly into doom territory but it keeps a thrash edge, making for a good well balanced mix.

‘Army Of Darkness’ is a dark brooding song, but again i think the vocal is slightly off, though i think thats because they have put on some kind of vocal fx.

I have to say as soon as i hit play on ‘To The End’ i got Hatebreeds ‘I Will Be Heard’ in my head, this is quite a hardcore/metalcore song, good but seems slightly out of place with the rest of the tracks.

‘The Gates Of Hades’ has some more great riffing in it, and all in all gets the album back on track.

Finally we have ‘Waste Away’ yet another great song, mid paced well mixed (The drum pedal work comes through a treat!) awesome guitarwork, but again i feel some work needed on the vocals.

All in all this is one helluva album and proof that the best metal still comes from this side of the Atlantic, my only drawback is some of the vocals.

Rating : 9/10

For fans Of : Viking Skull, Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, Evile

STU
Stu’s Reviews
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