Against the World

Back in the early 2000s when I'd first gotten into what became arguably the most popular sub-genre of metal in Europe, it was largely unfamiliar territory given that it had a much more limited exposure in the U.S., in spite of several prominent bands on the east coast of said country making waves in the underground and seeing greater success on the other side of the Atlantic. Nevertheless, I did encounter the occasional enthusiast here and there, and one time I recall encountering this band through a song on a friend's playlist that I would later find out was "Wings" off of the Italian heavy/power metal outfit Airborn's debut album Against The World. Of course, my reaction was more along the lines of "Hey, I didn't know Iron Savior had a new album out!", given the prominent lead vocal slot that Iron Savior front man and producer Piet Sielck has, trading blows with another vocalist that sounded remarkably similar to Kai Hansen. It would later come to my attention that there were a few bands that received production and guest musician services from the man who arguably helped pave the way for German speed metal, and this was among a number of albums that were purchased, the others naturally being Heavenly's debut and Paragon's Steelbound and Law Of The Blade.

But personal anecdotes aside, Airborn's earlier days mark a rather overt tendency in Piet Sielck's older days as a producer to stick pretty close to home, arguably even more so than his corresponding work with Heavenly and Paragon. Not only is does the guitar tone and vocal production have a fair degree of similarity to Iron Savior's turn-of-the-millennium sound, but Airborn took on their lyrical subjects and spacey synthesizer additives in a more comprehensive manner. The end result is an album that sounds remarkably similar to Iron Savior's second LP Unification, or what it would sound like if Kai Hansen had the more dominant vocal role and there was an even greater degree of keyboard aesthetics melded into the equation, resulting in something that's equally as fast and exciting, but ever so slightly lighter in character and closer to a vintage, late 80s Judas Priest sound. It contains the same mostly fast, most of the time speed metal feel that's actually far different from their latter day material (which tends to reflect more of a Running Wild style), and the ubiquitous presence of Sielck's background vocals brings on a sense of loftiness and density to the arrangement that, at times, almost comes across as a subtle nod to Queen.

The analogy to vintage Helloween is perhaps best explained in how this album is structured, which is as a collection of individual musical stories that don't flow as a concept, but are contained in an album that is structured similar to the conceptual feel of several other albums from 2001 that were concept albums. It comes with a brief instrumental intro and outro that has something of a techno-like feel to it in "Infernal Machine", and the proceeds to all but take the listener's head off with a barrage of merciless speed metal. Cruising celebrations of infectious hooks and machine gun drum work such as "Against The World", "Born To Fly" and "Projectile" light up the first half of this album, cut apart only by a slightly less mayhem-infused speeder "The Hero". Much of the rest of the album tends to rest in similar yet slightly less crazy territory and dwells a slight bit more on atmospheric and at times almost symphonic trappings via the keyboards, with the mini-epic "Sky City" being the most overt and almost leaning into Freedom Call territory at times with its happier melodic character. In fact, apart from the brief interlude into sappy balladry "Cry Now" which is decent by said standards, there isn't much of a respite to the barrage that rounds out 90% of this album, as was similarly the case with Iron Savior's 1999 magnum opus.

It's often a practice in the metal world, nay the entire musical world, to knock something that sounds so similar to something else as being a cheap imitation. Nevertheless, when I think of massive commonality that this album shares with my favorite Iron Savior album, I am likewise reminded of the fun-filled, powerhouse of an album U.D.O. put out in Timebomb as a homage to Judas Priest's 1990 swansong Painkiller. Granted, the emulation usually doesn't quite equal the object that is emulated, but it almost always functions as a great stylistic follow up, particularly if said sound is abandoned on subsequent efforts by the principle band. While Iron Savior never really shifted their style all that much in the later 2000s, they never really quite equaled the magic that they had when Kai Hansen was in the fold, owing to the long delayed musical collaboration that never materialized in the early 80s via Second Hell and Iron Fist. Albums like Against The World function as a sort of further affirmation of what took place and how it fueled a time of renewed interest in what was largely considered a passe style. Though it may never reach the same level of prominence as many others at its time, this reviewer considers this album a newer classic, and definitely a worthwhile listen to any lover of the power metal style.