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VII Gates hail
from Sweden and that alone should make you sit up and take
notice because the Swedes sure can rock. ‘In Hoc Signo
Vinces’ (In This You Will Conquer) is the band's
second release, but their first on Lion Music, and what a
way for the label to get their union off to a great start!
This album mixes
the more classic heavy metal with some more modern power
metal vibe and result is quite extraordinary. If you could
mix early Iron Maiden with Helloween you would probably get
something close to what VII Gates are doing. Big guitars
mixed with stunning powerful vocals and a tremendous all
powerful rhythm section.
The album opens
up with the rather unusual intro ‘When Gates Are Opening’. A
sort of Spinal Tap meet Johnny Carson talk show, but things
really get underway with the monster metal of ‘The Skyrider’,
a great mix of riffs from JJ Rockford and Robert Makek with
the towering vocals of Chris Blackburn adding that extra
metal edge to proceedings.
The band mix
those classic rock elements with that modern Power Metal
edge with great gusto on ‘Dreams They Haunt Me’, which has a
sort of Deep Purple metal vibe about it.
After another
short intro ‘March Of The Amazones’ before it's back to the
full out metal of ‘Answer To You, Heart (Stranger In The
Dark)’, before the epic ‘Immortal (Hymn To A Prison Guard)’.
A real true metal song much in the Helloween vein. Big
guitars and additional keyboards on this song really add
that bit extra to the sound and with Blackburn’s true metal
vocals, this track with suit the metalheads and the blue
collar rockers alike.
After the epic
tones of the previous track it's more heads down metal with
‘Lethal Attraction’. Again the keyboards are an added extra
that takes the sound out of the usual Heavy Metal genre and
gives it a certain something that makes it stand out from
the crowd and that's what you want to hear, something new
and refreshing.
Another
grandiose track is the six minute ‘Children Of The Corn’.
This is definitely at the Power Metal end of the bands
spectrum with soaring guitars from Rockford and Makek, added
to the monstrous rhythms of Nicola Pasa on bass and Mick Van
Slowfoot on drums. Behind every great Power Metal sound is
a great keyboard player and guest keyboardist of Tim Diaz
really lets loose on this one in true Power Metal style.
The epic metal
is more abundant on this album than the bands previous
releases and this shows the band are afraid to take things a
little further. This is again highlighted by the power
rendering's of ‘The Mad Minstrels (with delusions of
grandeur)' and again with the monster ‘The Lake’.
The album is
rounded off with two slices of guitar fuelled Hard Rock.
First up it’s the superb ‘Cat Eyes’, before rounding things
off with the slow burner ‘Feeding The Predator’, which
starts off with a little jazz funk vibe before unleashing
Blackburn’s power-ridden metal vocal.
This is a real
gem of an album that really gets me vote as it touches all
the right buttons for me, it rocks big style and that's what
I like. |
