Album: Kings of Metal
Artist: Manowar
Genre: Power Metal
Suggested by: The Batlord
Familiarity: I've heard a bit of Manowar's other stuff.
1. Wheels of Fire - Great, one of these engine starting songs. Alright, this is cool. Just your standard power/thrash metal song.
2. Kings of Metal - Already a band name drop in this song. And multiple times too. I'm rapidly readjusting my definition of how overly commercialized this band is. I mean, not that that's a bad thing. Alright, so this is like the first song, but slower, with a guitar solo in the middle. Cool.
3. Heart of Steel - This one throws in a ballad-y bit in the beginning. Okay, I like this. Vocals are great. Then it's back to the power metal stuff, but even slower this time. Still just as good. Though I feel like this might get old soon.
4. Sting of the Bumblebee - Thought about it when I saw the title, but I didn't actually think they would actually do this. So, for those too lazy, it's a recreation of Flight of the Bumblebee in power metal fashion. Serious props to them for the creativity. And some excellent picking skills as well. Sort of devolves into noise at the end. I really like this one.
5. The Crown and the Ring - Really getting epic here. With these battle themes, they're really abusing the band name. Still, good slower song, and great use of the choir.
6. Kingdom Come - Back to power chords for this one. The vocals really drive these songs. Relatively short (but still good) guitar solo in this one too. Honestly, this one is sort of bland. Worst song on the album nominee? Not that bad though.
7. Pleasure Slave - Alright, this is just uncomfortable. Yeah, this is one of those uncomfortably chauvinistic songs. It's absolutely hilarious though. Gives a new definition to "power metal". Alright, fine. This song is great.
8. Hail and Kill - Back to seriousness here. Now that I'm listening to the lyrics, there's a lot of innuendo is these songs. Pretty much the generic power metal structure again here.
9. The Warrior's Prayer - Literally a story. With accompanying noises. Interesting concept. It actually works much better than you'd expect. Great.
10. Blood of the Kings - The previous song ties into this one, story-wise. So, the majority of this song has the basic power metal structure from the other songs. Then it seemingly ends, and comes back in again, for a final reprise. A lot of noisiness built into the ending part.
This album surprised me. I did not think I would enjoy it as much as I did. It has just enough unique ideas to keep you interested the whole way through, and in that way, it's a great song. There are definitely some ups and downs, and at least a couple of the songs feel like filler. However, as much as possible, there are some good concepts thrown in there, so I'd say this is really an excellent album, especially for fans of the genre.
OVERALL RATING: 8.5/10