HEATHEN FORAY – Armored Bards CD
Black Bards Entertainment
This Austrian band takes the Viking/Battle metal genre to a new level. On the opener, and title cut, their sound reminded me of AMON AMARTH and DRAGONFORCE sharing the same tour bus. They’ve got the melodic death part down with the six finger fret dancing guitar soloing and the growled vocals. Ah but then that’s followed by “The Blight” which is a page ripped from Metal’s classic past with pounding riffs for headbanging and a decent crowd joining chorus plus some melodic soloing. Hell yeah this is great! Fact is that HEATHEN FORAY adds alot of cool stuff to their sound that doesn’t touch on the usual pagan black motif. This is their sophomore release. I never heard their debut, The Passage, from last year so all I’m going on is how well they compare to their contemporaries. HEATHEN FORAY seemed to have grasped a sound that’s distinct from the pack. Along with the afore mentioned styles the band blends much more into the stew. Power Metal gets blended in along with typical Folk elements but never overwhelming or blatantly obvious homage’s. “Bifrost” is a perfect example of everything coming together and it’s also sung in German. “Messenger of God” is pretty straight up Melodic Death Thrash worthy of a pit while “Endless Sorrow” could almost be considered a soul crushing Doom ballad. Another standout track is “Hopfen & Matz” a rowdy folk number perfect for a bar fight. All in all HEATHEN FORAY cover the bases to make this a damm good release.
www.black-bards.de/
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