Artist: Steelwing
Title: Zone of Alienation
Type: Album
Label: NoiseArt Records

Flying the flag for traditional heavy metal are Steelwing from Sweden, ‘Zone of Alienation’ is their second effort, and this is something that I have been waiting for since I first laid my ears on this band. ‘Tokkotai (Wind of Fury)’ does sound like fellow countrymen Enforcer from their most recent release, perhaps it’s the eastern song title, but the melodies are rapidly becoming much the same. ‘Solar Wind Riders’ has a strong sense of melody, the recorded sound is a little polished, a little perfect. I love these guitar riffs and lead breaks, they double track these riffs thus adding substance (twin axe attack!). Overall, this gives a little bit more depth, but there is a raw edge missing if that is something that you are looking for, but for me, it does not warrant such degradation, its perfect as it is.

Galloping guitars, throwing shapes, headbanging, denim and leather, that’s what I think of when I hear Steelwing, the vocals from Riley are better than some of the power metal big hitters, all the ranges are encountered, power screams are a welcomed in this genre, and you are duly rewarded. ‘The Running Man’ takes no prisoners from the opening notes, once again, the joyous use of melody takes this effort to the sort of levels associated with stadium filling bands of years gone by, I bet they like Accept, yeah, you can hear that, and of course those metal gods Priest feature in their music. The genius is ‘Lunacy Rising’, rousing, galloping, clichéd, call it what you want, its classic heavy metal, and at over ten minutes in length, you get a little piece of everything, a metal bible if you will, all of the blueprints are followed, time changes, a little blues, but the overall synopsis is that you will remain attentive throughout, it’s certainly not a boring song or album for that matter. In recent months, it blows the lid off some of the “acclaimed” traditional heavy metal newcomers that I have seen featured in many a magazine. If you want honest metal, Steelwing are certainly for you.

This is a well-rounded traditional metal album, but don’t expect a pure tribute album. What you have is a solid effort, that fills all the necessary gaps in your metal veins, it has relatively clean production (as do some of their label mates – e,g, Skullfist) but that really doesn’t overbear this album, what does are the facts that the songs are good enough, the melodies are spot on and this is an album that would sit well in any self-respecting metal fans collection.

http://www.myspace.com/steelwing

Paul Maddison

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