Artist: Metalsteel
Release: 2005
Metalsteel, the wonder “kids” of the scene, are tasting sin! “Taste The Sin” is their new record, their second, and it shows a huge leap forward from the band’s debut! The outstanding metal riffs are even more polished and refined, yet unbelievably listenable, and they hit you straight in the vein on first contact. Played with balls! They also carry just the right amount of aggression and anger, which, combined with a gorgeous feel for melody, simply grabs the listener’s full attention.
The band shines in riff construction, guitar embellishments and the polish of the solos. Thanks to their inventive variety (rhythm switches, motif switches), the songs carry a high level of dynamics and vibrant mood swings!. Why? Because the compositions keep a red thread running through them the whole time, the result of tasteful strings of chosen motifs that flow seamlessly into one another, or in other words, a “crafty stroll through the Iron Maiden legacy” (so not progressive, but complex enough for all the music nerds). The speed and precision are unbelievable. The picking (strumming) across the riffs is seriously striking – fast, tight, precise, the guitars breathing together in everything. At the same time, you don’t feel any influence of the general German-Scandinavian power metal revival in Metalsteel. Unlike the pretentiously epic pomp that so often marks German and Scandinavian power metal, Metalsteel, in their otherwise fascinating melodizing, aren’t ashamed to use semitone turns. “Taste The Sin” gains extra sharpness, aggression and arrogance from this, which gives the band an even more determined edge! On top of that, there’s an added whiff of amateurishness and defiance. That “feel” of the record loosely ties them to “old school speed metal” a la Helstar, Agent Steel and even some early Testament. Yet the feeling that remains is the genuinely homegrown, European one, which, with everything said so far as the common denominator, comes closest to the melodies of the early N.W.O.B.H.M. bands!
The opening track, The Curse of Love, mildly recalls the Saxon song Dogs Of War (“Dogs Of War”, 1994) in the shape of its “main riff”! That Metalsteel are made of true, noble metal steel is proven by the ballad Sweet Sorrow, which is no “sugarcoated cry-fest”. The band keeps a real tinge of disappointment and anger throughout, and that gives the record its resolve and its charm!
The songs are true metal anthems. Metalsteel just let a song run! Once they build up the punch in it, it doesn’t let up at a single point! That kind of punch is real mental food for every headbanger. The last track, The Lonely Man’s Revenge, is especially successful at destroying and incinerating across the board.
The vocals are angry and recognizable! Never sweet! The vocal lines are tuneful and sung with feeling, nicely rounded, with no chopping up of the melody lines themselves that would rob the songs of their punch. That goes for the songs written in Slovenian too. With top-notch guitar playing and a “lead” vocal like that, Beny is growing into a true upgrade of Kai Hansen (Gamma Ray).
Metalsteel are an extremely refreshing attraction on the metal scene, even on a global scale! For Slovenia they represent a kind of “revival” of that true, hard-boiled form of heavy metal, which today is basically not represented in any real way on the soil of the “Šentflorjan hen” (as we jokingly call our little country)! I think we Slovenes haven’t even given ourselves a real chance to be proud of a band like this, and I think that with “Taste The Sin” and Metalsteel the time to finally take that chance has ripened. It’s clear that Metalsteel know exactly what they want. That’s one of the basic requirements, or pillars, of any band that can lead to success and to its own evolutionary blossoming onward! Metalsteel have chosen the right path!
Lineup
Benjamin “Beny” Kic – vocals, guitar
Rok “Rock The Shock” Tomšič – guitar
Matej Sušnik – bass
Daša Trampuš – drums
Guest musician:
Gašper Kačar – keyboards
Production
Mark Lemer
Track list
1. The Curse Of Love
2. The Eye Of The Pyramid
3. Črni raj
4. Trapped In The Nightmare
5. Heavy Metal Is Our Religion
6. Sweet Sorrow
7. Thermopylai
8. Svoboda
9. Noč strasti
10. The Lonely Man’s Revenge
Album length: 51:42
