Rating: RRRR
Review by Kimmo Toivonen
”Steelbound” is the seventh Battle Beast album, which means that this incarnation of the band has released more albums than the original band led by Anton Kabanen. Some fans are still longing for the traditional power metal sound of the old days, but the band has gone from strength to strength with their more versatile style. ”Steelbound” continues on the same path, incorporating influences from various eras and genres.
The four songs released before the actual album have given the public a good taste of things to come. ”Last Goodbye” is a traditional BB banger with echoes of ”Eden” and ”Beyond The Burning Skies”, while ”Here We Are” is an airy, melodic number. The title track reminded me initially of Abba and The Night Flight Orchestra, but now I have to add ”I’m So Excited” by the Pointer Sisters to the mix! Anyway, it’s one of my favourites and catchy as hell, even though I’m still not sure about the very metallic bridge. The last one of the singles is ”Angel Of Midnight”, an awesome hard rock track and another personal favourite. The verses owe a little to those of H.E.A.T.’s ”In And Out Of Trouble”.
So far, none of the ”new” songs have risen to challenge the singles. There’s five of them, as ”The Long Road” is just a two-minute instrumental intro to ”Blood Of Heroes”. The album opens with ”The Burning Within”, representing the metallic side of the band, but still melodic enough. After a couple of the singles already discussed, we get ”Twilight Cabaret”, which sounds like a relative of ”Master Of Illusion”, although the arrangement features some very unusual elements - do I hear some salsa beats or was that rumba?
Next ”newbie” is the aforementioned ”Blood Of Heroes”, a semi-symphonic track which has Sabaton written all over it, musically and lyrically. ”Riders Of The Storm” shows a light-hearted ”Happy Metal” side of Battle Beast and won’t probably be a favourite of the True Metal crowd... It’s a fun song but I can’t really take it seriously. Then again, why should I? ”Watch The Sky Fall” closes the album, and I was kind of expecting a ballad, but it’s not. A decent, somewhat understated mid tempo song anyway.
There’s been a change in the songwriting duties, as keyboard player/producer Janne Björkroth isn’t the main writer anymore, with only two songs credited to him and his songwriting partner Elise Widemark. Bassist Eero Sipilä has written four of the tracks, guitarist Joona Björkroth two and one is their collaboration. Vocalist Noora Louhimo shines as usual, she is absolutely one of the most impressive vocalists of today.
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