 |
| Album
Review |
|
|
If you are lucky enough to be going to see Metallica
at the end of the month then you are in for a special
treat as The Sword are one of the support acts on
the tour and I couldn’t praise the band enough,
they are simply fantastic, if you are into big fat
guitar riffs in the style of Black Sabbath and Metallica
and mouth watering guitar solos then The Sword are
a band that are going to get you excited and when
I say excited I mean very excited.
Just in case you are yet to hear of the band I will
give you some background information, they are a
quartet who formed in Austin Texas in 2004, they
have been signed to Kemado Records since late 2005,
they went on to release their debut album ’Age
Of Winters’ during February 2006 and then
went on to release their latest album ‘Gods
Of Earth’ during April 2008.
If you haven’t got either of the albums by
The Sword then your lucky day is just around the
corner as the band are releasing the albums bundled
as a special double pack to coincide with the Metallica
tour and if you shop around you will be able to
pick up the package for £10 for both album
which is a mighty fine bargain if you ask me especially
considering how quality both albums are.
The band’s first album ‘Age Of Winters’
is a great album from start to finish, it features
just 9 tracks but runs for a nifty 42 minutes, if
anyone wants to relive that Black Sabbath moment
and hear killer Tony Iommi style guitar riffs then
look no further than ‘Age Of Winters’
by The Sword as it sounds like a heavier better
produced version of Black Sabbath.
The album opens with ‘Celestial Crown’
the song is a short instrumental track and it’s
a nice build of how the album means to go on, as
soon as the song reaches its climax ‘Barael’s
Blade’ kicks in with meaty guitar riffs and
big kick arse constant drumming and J.D Cronise
vocals coming in with a spoken word type style sitting
in nicely with the groove of the song.
The whole album is really strong with the way it
has hard hitting riff after hard hitting riff, enough
groove to get the biggest of idiots dancing along,
and a set of the best sounding vocals I have heard
in metal in a long time and to top that off the
lyrics are well written as well.
The album ‘Age Of Winters’ introduces
you to The Sword nicely but it is ‘Gods Of
The Earth’ that really blows you away, the
album features 11 tracks and runs for 47minutes
and every minute of the album is amazing, where
‘Age Of Winters’ was quite heavy and
turned up to 10, The Sword have stepped things up
even more for ‘Gods Of The Earth’ and
turned things right up to 11. As soon as you hear
the instrumental introduction of ‘The Sundering’
you clearly see that the band have beefed their
sound up with the thick heavy guitar riffs.
’The Frost-Giant’s Daughter’ is
a great song with the way it is jam packed with
thick thrash metal guitar riffs and once again J.D
Cronise spoken word style catchy vocals, whilst
everything sounds that little bit heavier this time
around for The Sword, the whole song writing seems
that more polished off with the way the songs run
for even longer and also the big variety within
the songs.
All the songs on the album follow the same fashion,
with their big solid guitar riffs, catchy groove
and near spoken word vocals, well until the ‘Untitled’
outro which closes the album is a mellow instrumental
format.
If you are looking for a solid metal release that
brings the old skool metal sound into the twenty
first century then look no further than this double
pack by The Sword as it brings 70’s Black
Sabbath style rock into recent times and at the
same time tells tales of myth and mythology which
is bound to please all those War hammer and Dungeon
And Dragons fans out there.
5/5
Review by Trigger |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Band
Members |
|
|
J. D. Cronise (vocals, guitar)
Kyle Shutt (guitar)
Bryan Richie (bass)
Trivett Wingo (drums) |
|
|
|
|
|
| Track
Listing |
|
|
Age Of Winters
1. Celestial Crown
2. Barael's Blade
3. Freya
4. Winter's Wolves
5. Horned Goddess
6. Iron Swan
7. Lament for the Aurochs
8. March of the Lor
9. Ebethron
Gods Of The Earth
1. Sundering
2. Frost-Giant's Daughter
3. How Heavy This Axe
4. Lords
5. Fire Lances of the Ancient Hyperzephyrians
6. To Take the Black
7. Maiden, Mother & Crone
8. Under the Boughs
9. Black River
10. White Sea |
|
|
|
|
|
| Band
Related Links |
|
|
| Review
Score Code |
|
|
- Top Cheese
- Brilliant
- Pretty damn good
- Ok I guess
-
What Was That? |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
