Tag Archives: 2006

Classic Rock, Genre, Heavy Metal, NWOBHM, Progressive Rock

Iron Maiden – Brighter Than A Thousand Suns (Song Review)

6 Comments

“Cold fusion of fury”

Iron Maiden’s 2006 album A Matter Of Life And Death proved that the British metal veterans were still an act to be reckoned with, delivering some of their most vital and creative material for years. No track illustrated this better than album highlight Brighter Than A Thousand Suns. Making great use of a churningly tense and ominous time signature, it’s one of Maiden’s proggiest and heaviest songs. Frontman Bruce Dickinson goes all Van Der Graaf Generator with dark, coded lyrics that depict the dawn of the nuclear age (and the influence is made crystal clear with a lyrical nod to the VDGG track Whatever Would Robert Have Said?) Musically there’s a Rush-like feel with the band twisting and turning through a range of moody, tricky sections. And Dickinson responds to the song’s dynamic shifts with a vocal performance that builds in intensity in a breathtaking and explosive way. Brighter Than A Thousand Suns is a track that is stylistically uncharacteristic for the band but, in terms of theatrics and excitement, has all the spirit of Maiden at their most classic.

Album Reviews, Classic Rock, Genre, Hard Rock, Progressive Rock

Rush – Grace Under Pressure Tour (Album Review)

20 Comments
Rush – Grace Under Pressure Tour (Anthem – 2006)

I’ve been listening to Rush quite a bit recently and you can’t have a Rush kick without taking in a live album or two. It’s been a while since I’ve listened to the excellent Grace Under Pressure Tour, recorded in 1984 but released as a bonus CD with their 2006 DVD set Replay x 3. The album they were touring, Grace Under Pressure, is right up there as one of my favourite Rush studio albums so it’s great to have some live tracks from the era. The guitar solo in Red Sector A is breathtaking and the lively, pumping take on the The Enemy Within is far superior to the studio version.  The recording is taken from one of the DVDs from the box set and isn’t a whole show unfortunately, but it’s still a great listen with some excellent performances. And, given the band’s fashion crimes of the era, the audio-only option is very welcome.

Replica tour book from the Replay X 3 box set
Doom Metal, Genre, Heavy Metal, Song Reviews

Warning – Footprints (Song Review)

7 Comments

“Here I am wide open”

Warning: listening to Footprints may induce melancholia. Emotive performances always go well with the ponderous spaces and tempos of doom metal but UK’s Warning take it to an unusually sad and vulnerable level on this sublime track from 2006’s Watching From A Distance. In fact, Footprints is more in the Anathema/Marillion zone of hearfelt, emotional catharsis. I’m too much of a satanic viking to get on board with the wallowing, introspective lyrics but the staggering combination of lurching low end, beautiful ringing chords and Patrick Walker’s distinctive, wistful vocals doesn’t half hit me right in the feels.

Black Metal, Genre, Heavy Metal, Song Reviews

I – Warriors (Song Review)

27 Comments

818ctocsajl-_sl1500_

“Head to the battlefields”

You’d expect a black metal supergroup featuring members of Immortal, Enslaved and Gorgoroth to be an all-out blaster. But, instead, their 2006 album Between Two Worlds was a more traditional affair: the band using the new project to celebrate their pre-2nd Wave influences and indulge in a bit of hero worship. Pre-2nd Wave heroes don’t get much bigger than Bathory and their mastermind Quorthon had died just two years earlier so many of the tracks here have a Bathory influence all over them. Of those, this is my favourite. It’s an epic lament which finds the world-weary Vikings riding their tired horses out “from the mountainous regions” to “where great warriors sleep”. Pillaging can be such a grind. But Warriors’ mix of bold defiance (“It’s a great day for fire”) and raging sadness is always stirring.