Old school metal: hop on board!
Artiste: Devil's Train
Nationality: Unknown
Album: Devil's Train
Year: 2012
Label: Edel/Ear Music
Genre: Hard rock/Heavy metal
Tracks:
Fire and water
Devil's train
Roll the dice
To the ground
Forever
Sweet devil's kiss
Find new love
Room 66/64
Coming home
Yellow blaze
The answers
American woman
Chronological position: Debut album
Familiarity: Zero
Interesting factoid:
Initial impression: Great harmonica to start off, then the guitars kick in and the ride begins!
Best track(s): Devil's train, Roll the dice, Sweet devil's kiss, Room 66/64, Coming home
Worst track(s): Nah, no passengers on
this train, hombre!
Comments: Sometimes you just decide to try an album because the title is cool, yeah? And who would not be impressed by a metal band with a name like Devil's Train? The only real problem I have here is that I can't tie down an actual nationality for this brand new band: seems it's made up both of former members of Mystic Prophecy, who come from Germany, and Stratovarius, who are of course Finnish. Either way, they actually sound American, something of a common trait with many new metal bands coming up these days. Not a bad thing --- you can get a bit tired of the harsh German accent, let's be honest, and these guys sound, on this first outing, like they could give some of the bigger US bands a run for their money.
Others have commented that the band fall between the stools of hard rock and heavy metal, and indeed I'd agree. Were you to meet them in a bar, they'd probably be stretched out lazily across both, occupying both the bluesier, heavier end of the former with the cutting edge of the latter. With people like Jorg Michael and Jari Kaneulainen of Stratovarius and of course founder member and vocalist of Mystic Prophecy R.D. Liapakis in attendance, you probably know what to expect.
You'd be wrong.
Whereas both those bands practice essentially power/speed/thrash metal, Devil's Train hurtles along on rails of classic hard rock and the kind of metal typified by bands like Saxon and early Tygers of Pan Tang. There's a great bite in the guitar work of Laki Ragazas, and RD's vocals while not screaming definitely punch your face in, in the most enjoyable way possible. Power rockers like the title track,
Roll the dice and
Room 66/64 (see what they did there?)
are pretty much the order of the day, and the pace hardly slackens at all right through the album. You really do feel like you're on a headlong ride to the sweetest hell imaginable!
There are the metal crunchers too, like
To the ground and
Yellow blaze, and if anyone thinks that the opening guitar riff from
Forever sounds like Bryan Adams's
Run to you, I agree, although this song is nothing close to that big rock hit. Great vocal performance from RD and soulful guitar from Laki, and there's almost a tinge of AOR to this, which is no criticism of Devil's Train, just shows how versatile they can be. They also get a superb anthem in
Coming home as well as a ballad ... nah, just kiddin'! No slow song on this album. THIS train don't slow down for no-one, man!
Ain't that how we like it?
Overall impression: Powerful debut, blows some other major bands away and I reckon these guys have a really bright future ahead of them. If you like old-school hard rock mixed with some serious metal you better climb on board while there's still room! Already booking my ticket for the return trip!
Intention: Nothing I can do but wait for the next album, and keep playing this one.