Riders on the Storm

For many, "Riders On The Storm" is the best album from "Die Apokalyptischen Reiter", it includes the legendary "Friede sei mit dir" (Peace May Be With You), probably their most known song. With this album the band created an astonishing sound with the genre variety. If you want to listen to a "Reiter" album for the first time, this would be the best choice, in my opinion.

The song "Friede sei mit dir" is probably one of the best openers I've ever heard, it's simply the perfect song to start this album. Fast, heavy, and folk. This song is simply amazing, it has the catchiest guitar sound I've ever heard on my entire life. The drums are so fucking fast but still have great rhythm and there is also an unforgettable piano solo. I don't want to get in details with every song, but this one really deserved it. In general terms you will not hear songs sounding similar to each other, as it always happens with this band, you can hear folk, heavy, thrash, death and even more elements. The most surprising thing is that you will find also some Spanish and Latin-American music influences in the songs "Revolution" and "Schenk mir heut' Nacht", and that mixed with metal, sounds really awesome, at least the way these guys do it.

The guitar work is one of the highlights here: powerful and catchy riffs is what this album contains, some outstansing guitar solos and always great melodies accompained by attractive bass lines. The melodies of which I'm talking about would not have the same impact if Dr. Pest hadn't manage to play the keyboards with such variety throughout the entire album, you can hear, besides the classic keyboard sounds, some piano solos, and accordions for the folk elements. Guest musicians should not be overlooked at all, the violin work performed in "Seemann" is remarkable, as well as the trombone and trumpet used in songs like "Revolution" for that Spanish/Latin-American sound. On the other hand, the drumming provides an astonishing powerful element to the music, you can hear very fast drum beats as well as slower and more elaborated ones, the percussion work performed in "MMMH" is simply awesome.

The singing is always powerful, melodic and heavy, in some songs the singing can be soft as well. The singer "Fuchs" knows when he needs to switch his singing, I don't see any mistakes in this area. There's also some screams performed by the bass player "Volk-Man", only on those songs in which it was appropriate. When it comes to the lyrics, I could say exactly the same thing, no non-sense lyrics, but hopeful, wise and suitable lyrics. The lyrics are about peace, war, hope and there's also a song about a sailor: "Seemann", one of the best folk metal songs I've ever heard. So bassically you have an incredible metal album, don't try to put into a specific genre, because you will not be able to do it.

The more I listen to this album, the more I love it, so I can really see any flaws, some could say there is an inconsistency because of the change of styles here and there, and maybe that could be a reason not to give it a 100, but for me, those changes lead the album to perfection. 100 out of 100 is more than deserved.

Highlights: "Friede sei mit dir", "Seemann", "Der Adler", "Revolution", "Soldaten dieser Erde", "Schenk mir heut' Nacht", "Himmelskind" and "MMMH".

I picked up this album on a whim after hearing the title track on their myspace (I don’t have one I swear!) and was pleasantly surprised with the overall consistency and freshness that the Riders posses. Death/folk metal may be a deceiving term, at least for this album. There are folk elements, such as some various wind instruments and violins like in Seemann, but after a listen through the full album, “folk” doesn’t seem to be the right word. “Death” also seems to be an overstatement in terms of the general br00talness of this album, as you won’t find any death grunts, nor will you find the crushing, muted, blistering riffs of standard death metal. Rather, in my opinion it contains sort of an almost…dare I say it...nu-metal feel? I know it’s treacherous, but truly for me it’s not a totally inaccurate way to describe Riders on the Storm.

I think of nu-metal when it comes to this album because the vocals are essentially similar to Rammstein’s, the guitar-work is generally strummed powerchords, and there aren’t many blastbeats or intricate forms of drum-work. That in mind, the Riders manage to convey much more than that on this record. As mentioned, there are some folk elements and many well-timed acoustic interludes. There are nice lead melodies and even a couple quality solos.

What makes this album stand out for me is its ability to produce catchy riffs and hooks without straying from the elements that make it metal. The result is an arsenal of memorable songs with the heaviness to get you headbanging but the mainstream edge to make it accessible to most people.

What must be pointed out though is that this album is not for extreme metalheads. If you’re looking for an uber-heavy death metal band with folk influences, Riders on the Storm is not the album for you. There aren’t any grunts or shrieks here, nor are there insane tremolo-picked, blastbeated sections (well maybe a couple, but they’re not commonplace.) This is just straight up heavy metal riffing mixed in with acoustic, folky-sounding parts which keeps the entire thing fresh and creative enough so that you’re surprised by what comes next.

In summary, Die Apokalyptischen Reiter’s latest album, Riders on the Storm, is geared towards a wide audience because it’s not extreme but it's not too poppy either. If you want a record you can spin when you don’t quite have the energy for Necrophagist, but you just aren’t in the mood for Madonna...this is a nice choice. I give it an 87% score.

Standout Songs: Friede Sei Mit Dir, Riders on the Storm, Der Adler, Wenn Ich Träume, Himmelskind