Fear prevails in the ranks of metal heads with lactose intolerance as apart from Hammerfall this year we have a new album from Dream Evil! The team from Gothenburg hits relentlessly for the seventh time with “Metal Gods”.
Dream Evil then. Brainchild of producer Fredrik Nordstrom who with this band wanted to pay homage to classic 80’s heavy metal at a time when the classic sound was not at its best. He was already a household name since as a producer he was behind the console on almost all the successful Swedish melodic death metal albums of the time. The bang came in 2002 with the excellent “Dragonslayer” followed by the equally enjoyable “Evilized” in 2003 and “The Book Of Heavy Metal” in 2004. Somewhere there the band’s decline began and as a result from 2006 onwards we have only four releases.
“Metal Gods” comes seven years after “Six” which for me was their lowest work. But here the band makes a wild refrain. From the opening title track everything is in place. Heavy and satiating guitar riffs, strong tones of Manowar, the kings of cheese that is, and lyrics with the album titles of the industry. If another band did this now, we’d probably be talking about a parody.
But here we are talking about Dream Evil. And the album has many excellent compositions, such as “The Tyrant Dies At Dawn”, “Insane” and “Night Stalker”. But there are also 1-2 pure filler tracks like “Born In Hell” for example. Nothing new and nothing original. But these are Dream Evil and what they do they do it right.
I don’t have much to say about production issues. We are talking about the Nordstrom format so the possibility that the sound was like a recording using a refrigerator was zero. Heavy, modern and crystalline in other words.
Without reaching the greatness of their first works, “Metal Gods” is a really good album that will especially please the fans of the sound. If you have not had any contact with the band in the past I recommend “Evilized” as a reference point. 2024 and Dream Evil still have a lot to tell us.
