Hailing from Sweden and formed in 1989 by bassist B.J. Laneby M.ill.ion throw out classic metal with some modern sound inflections.  The band’s influences of Rainbow, Dio and Accept can be easily traced through the guitar riffs and arrangements and everything is well played yet seems to lack the overall killer delivery to take it out of the “average” stakes.   Vocalist Ulrich Carlsson has a strong voice but lyrics are incredibly cliché as backed up by song titles such as “Thrill Of The Chase”, “From Heaven To Hell” and “Son Of The Son”.  Guitarist Jonas Hermansson and Hammond Organist/Keyboardist Johan Bergquist intertwine well taking their cues from Blackmore and Carey/Rosenthal but there are few surprises here.The more modern hard rock timbres of “Menace To Society” with its infectious chorus and more original sounding delivery stand out from the majority of the numbers whilst the Deep Purple-ish swagger of “Slave To You” is another success.   But all too often tracks such as “U.F.O.”, “ Through The Eyes Of A Child” and “Fires Of Siberia” (with a hint of early Europe about it) never get out of the second division in terms of excitement.   That said whilst the production is generally good it does lack a little punch with the vocals being overly high in the mix to these ears.  Overall nothing terrible but nothing that really hits home to take the album out of average to good.

Rating – 75%

ZERO HOUR - DARK DECEIVER
Sensory - May 26th 2008

"Dark Deceiver" is Zero Hour’s fifth album from the band led by the guitars of Jasun Tipton and bass of brother Troy Tipton.  The line-up is completed by drummer Mike Guy and vocalist Chris Salinas.  The band delivery what can only be described as experimental technical metal in so much as there are numerous musical segments on each track with very complex passages and precision yet all tracks seem to lack any form of “traditional” song craft which makes its incredibly difficult to get into or get a hold of where each track is actually at.  Opener “Power To Believe” is a perfect example of this approach where the basic feeling you get at the end of it is just one of nausea and disorientation.  It’s almost as if Zero Hour had a million different ideas and decided to throw them into one song, along with the kitchen sink and then do that for the following 8 tracks as well.  Unfortunately the proceedings are also not helped by a weak mix where no instrumental seems to fit well with one another despite each instrument being clearly audible so its quite hard to hear why it doesn't quite as good as you would hope for.  The overall feel of the album is dark, vocalist Chris Salinas does his best to add to this aura yet his vocal style which jumps from notes only dogs can hear to guttural growls in the space of a single word also add another “difficult angle” to the music, which is a shame as when the band do play it straight for a few milliseconds before the next idea comes into play there is definite skill in evidence.  But for me this is just too chaotic, too all over the place and too weird to be considered enjoyable.  At the end of making it through 4 listens  of this album (and that was hard work) I need a lie down and possible therapy to calm my vertigo.

Rating – 40%

CRYSTALLION - HATTIN
Dockyard1 - 19th May 2008

German melodic power metallers Crystallion serve up a slice of metal in “Hattin” to make all fantasy metallers who get excited by stories based on the “Templar Myths” stand up and take notice.  Based on the battle of Hattin which took place on July 4^th 1187 and was the biggest military defeat of the crusaders, the loss of big parts of the Crusader states including the Kingdom of Jerusalem to the Muslims was finally the beginning of the end of the Crusader states in the Holy Land.  With this grandiose theme Crystallion have set about serving this up in music and they have given it a good stab and generally suceed.  The first thing I had to check when listening to this was whether the vocalist was actually Timo Kotipelto as vocalist Thomas Strübler multi-octave voice and tonality is a very close match, although he does hang in the lower registers more so than Kotipelto but when he reaches the high notes (with ease it must be noted) the comparison is totally deserved. 

Classic era Stratovarius is a good stylistic reference point for where Crystallion are coming from musically along with the more metallic elements of Rhapsody of Fire so expects lot of double bass drum, synchronised 16^th note riffs and big bombastic and glorious choruses.  Sadly the lead work of Florian Ramsauer and Patrick Juhász (who is somewhat of a late Steve Stevens look-alike in the hair dept) never really get above an average mark but there are plenty of musical goodies to be enjoyed here with the track "Under Seige" being a definite highlight.  As is often the nature of these things each track does lack individuality but Power Metal fans never seem to worry about this so if you are a big fan of the genre prepare to enjoy the hell out of this but for the regular listener this will sound like a generally well done version of what you would expect with no surprises.  Overall “Hattin” is a promising second album from Cyrstallion and if they can find a little variety on their next album they will be contenders for being a big name in the genre.

Rating – 80%