Very enjoyable to listen to.

Growing up in the seventies and eighties gave me a love for many of the bands who made up the NWOBHM, yet as soon as I discovered AOR, melodic rock and prog, I sadly left those heavy metal bands behind (probably missing out on tons of good music). And over the past thirty odd years to my chagrin I haven't really listened to many straight ahead "Heavy Metal" albums. So it was somewhat refreshing to hear this album by Saxony based metal band Alpha Tiger, who according to their bio want to bring back some of the more traditional elements of heavy metal whilst using the up to date production techniques that are now available to record them.

The band's music has a more American metal feel to it than a British one, reminding me at times of Malice, Armoured Saint and early Fates Warning, which is no bad thing. The songs themselves are filled with lots of twin lead guitar breaks, screaming vocals and pounding bass lines, and the songs ain't half bad either. 'Crimson Desert', 'Man Or Machine' and the obligatory ballad 'When Autumn Leaves Fall' are all very good slabs of metal, though for me it is on the back half of the album where the band really start to shine. 'Against The Time' is pure Iron Maiden, riffs abound and the solos scream, 'Karma', with it's almost thrash like riff, is probably my favourite song on the album, intense and in your face the band really go for it on this track, and finishing off with 'Black Star Pariah' is an excellent way for the band to go out with a bang.

Like I said at the start, pure heavy metal isn't usually my thing, but Alpha Tiger have made an album that I found to be very enjoyable to listen to. They won't win any awards for originality, though I don't think that's what they want to do, but for sheer enthusiasm and love for the music, they get my vote.

Ian Johnson