Tried-and-true yet shrieky and fatiguing screechy production, a re-use of alien themes, that caustic caw, and those almost doomy tower of power chords.
Offering everything you’d want out of a live album, Hammerfall make this thing look and sound like Live After Death. The set is spirited throughout, one show in the band’s hometown of Gothenburg, Sweden.
Ten songs (11 tracks, but one of ’em’s an intro), four of which are already available elsewhere. The greedy part of me wishes this album was all new stuff.
Soilwork somehow managed to combine their love of hard rock strutting with Gothenburg blood and Oakenfold house in a formula that didn’t stink to high heaven.
Metal is alive and well and living in Europe. Americans futz with knuckledragging nĂĽ metal and ’til-you-grow-outta-it hardcore, European metal pushes forward.