Last Updated on 07:48 PM by Giorgos Tsekas
Genre: Power Metal
Country: Greece
Label: Metal Breed Records
Year: 2017
I remember a party, one of the many me and a friend of mine held some years ago, when the levels of maturity (or was it immaturity?) reached the skies with us playing “blind man’s buff”. A game that I recall in 1988 -89, Metal Hammer had translated from the German issue, an article in which some of the stars we knew were asked to listen to some songs and then they had to guess what the song or even the band is. Similarly, the game was played among the fans until the late 90’s and it was probably forgotten when apps like Shazam and the likes came along, if not earlier, with Youporn and similar sites which monopolized their interests. Back to that party, my friend, the 70s guru and an ex member of Manowar’s fan club, loaded Power Crew (“The Sign of Rage”) and the rest of us lost the match to a goal scored in the last seconds. I don’t want to believe that this was the reason why it took me so long to write this review.
To the serious stuff now, Power Crew are part of the Greek Heavy Metal Music History. Even though the band has just five albums despite the fact they were formed in 1992, all of them are of exceptional quality. And even though their debut carried 20plus years on its back and has been connected with romantic years of teenage angst listening sessions, Power Crew’s latest album seems to be their best moment so far and can look ‘The Sign of Rage’ in the eye without exaggeration.
Lyrically speaking, Power Crew tell us a quite interesting story, with historical figures, creating thus a concept album with the effort of Judas (as he is pictured) to forgive (through his reincarnations) his treachery towards the face of Christ, a story having as a subtitle the words we hear in the introduction of the album: This is the unknown story of a great friendship, loyalty and betrayal ‘.
Music wise, without discovering the wheel, they engage in high-quality traditional Heavy / Power with epic moods and reaping riffs. Melodic moments are not missing, of course, with the solos being correctly positioned scattered and tied together with Kostas Tokas’ vocals, who in the second album behind Power Crue’s microphone sounds even more confident and theatrical. The songs have lyricism, intense moments and peaks that blend in with the story and narration. There is no lack of double bass drums, but the rotation in the tempo ranging from Black Sabbath’s ‘Heaven In Hell’ to ‘The Temple’, ‘Song Of Hope’ and ‘Dementia’ raging speeds.
Well-written, full and ideally played, it deserves the attention of all those who like modern Power away from the cheesy europower (eg Sabaton) and find pleasure in concept albums.