Lord of Darkness

Well, this is it. With their latest release, Stormhammer have really hit rock-bottom. Just when I thought that they epitomized boring, generic power metal with their previous records, Stormhammer amaze me once again. A lack of originality and uninspired, boring songs are what make power metal an extremely hit-or-miss genre. With "Lord of Darkness," these guys have successfully highlighted everything that could be done wrong on a power metal record. Every single song follows the same formula; they did not even make an honest attempt at creative songwriting when it comes to the actual music. Secondly, you can guess when the ballad is going to come when you've never even heard the album before. Third of all, the catchy choruses that save so many other power metal albums are nonexistent here. It sounds like they made big epic choruses just for the sake of making big epic choruses; they are completely forgetable and I garuntee you will not remember any of these songs the next day. Overall, this is run-of-the-mill, clearance rack power metal, which is a dime a dozen nowadays. Stay away.

As a funny sidenote, whoever translated the lyrics for these guys was obviously fucking with them. There is a line on the song "Stormhammer" that says "We are ultra-mundane." How right they are!

Standouts: None.