Label: GMR 2018
Review by: Urban "Wally" Wallstrom
The Apocalypse dawning according to the Swedes of Tad Morose and the opening track off their latest album, Chapter X (that's 10/ten if you're not a fan of latin/roman or numbers for that matter). Then again, if we're going by song titles, it's all very deprived, dusty, cynical and preachy. I do recall praising the band and some of their earlier work featuring the excellent vocalist Urban. It's no wonder considering that we share the excellent name (latin strikes again - it'll never happen, but that's twice in just a couple of sentences). Acta est fabula plaudite.
It's a new-ish vocalist nowadays and a new chapter in the history of the band (yes -it's X). Unfortunately nothing on the Chapter X album live ups to the highs of the band and their back catalogue, with a large number of fillers and stale arrangements. Closest to the Urban Breed era would be the decent work of Slaves To The Dying Sun. It has the sheer attitude, guts and blood needed to really come across as Conan Metal. The others are either sonically flat or lacking proper vocal melodies. It's heavy, it's power, but you can simply forget about finding the memorable riff or the decent shout-a-long refrain.
It's perhaps a bit harsh. However. I prefer to be loudly singing-along to my power metal hymns as I ride to the battle field while bashing my plastic sword against my ditto shield. Make no mistake. Christer Andersson as well as Kenneth Jonsson are fine guitarists with passable true metal-esque execution and performances as well as technique and tone. It's just that song-wise Chapter X is as bland an album as you could expect from the likes of Bon Jovi or even Take That.
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