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Artist: Thunderstone |
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This year
there has been a resurgence in great bands coming out of Finland and
another to add to this list is the mighty Thunderstone, who release their
fifth opus 'Dirt Metal', a triumph for Scandinavian Metal. This new
album sees a few changes in the line up from the bands previous albums,
after the shock departure of singer Pasi Rantanen and keyboard player
Kari Tornack back in 2007, it just took a few months to find
suitable replacements. Rick Altzi took up the vacant vocal position and Jukka Karinen filled
the keyboard role. With the lineup complete the band retired deep into
Finnish woods to write and record new songs, the result of which is 'Dirt
Metal'. Well the
title says it all as far as I’m concerned, this is pure power driven
Heavy Metal from the off. A little darker and heavier than previous
album perhaps, but this isn’t a bad thing, this is great groove filled metal
that will appeal to a wide spectrum of Metal fans both old and new. Things get
underway in impressive style after the intro ‘Rebirth’ with the
massive ‘I Almighty’, which instantly gives you a feel of what is to
come with Altzi delivering some fine vocals, while Nino Laurenne fires
out some quite spectacular guitar licks, with Titus Hjelm punishing the
bass and Mirka Rantanen equally flamboyant on the drums, with Jukka
Karinen adding some quite graceful keyboards. A great start to the album
for sure. One of my
favourite tracks off the album has to be the blazing riff filled
spectacle ‘Dirt Metal’. This title track is just a great pounding
metal track that will rock your very foundations. The booming metal is
continued with ‘Blood That I Bleed’, with Rantanen providing a strong
back beat. Those skins are sure taking a pounding on this one. The band
really turn up the metal dial with the angst filled ‘Star’ before
the guitar metal returns with ‘Ghosts of Youth’, a track that delves
into the darker Power Metal feel, with Altzi delivering one of his best
vocals on the album so far. There no
holding this band back as they keep delivering the goods with
‘Counting Hours’ and the titanic fast paced ‘Dodge The Bullet’,
with some quite sublime keyboards courtesy of Karinen. But it I had to
pick one track that cements what Thunderstone are all about then
‘Deadlights’ is that track. It’s dark, it's heavy, but it still keeps
true that
melodic metal side. A real classy piece of Scandinavian Metal. The tempo is
picked up once more with the mighty ‘At The Feet Of Fools’, before
the album closes with the dark heady bass line of ‘Suffering Song’,
which rounds off what has to be one of the Metal albums of the year so far
for me, a great release, again the Scandinavians are showing how it should be
done. |
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Tracklisting: 1.
Rebirth |
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