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Album Reviews : Grave Digger – Healed By Metal

By on January 24, 2017

grave-digger-healed-by-metal-artwork-600x600I don’t know if there is something in the beer in Germany but for some reason power metal bands seem to have some freakishly longevity when they originate from there. Helloween, Blind Guardian, there’s plenty on offer – but it always seems easy to gloss over Grave Digger on that list. With their latest release Healed by Metal the band still proves that they have every ounce of what it takes to stand amongst the modern crop of power metal bands while still staying true to their traditional roots.

From the opening second of the album, the first track greets you with its namesake with a thundering hollaring cry ‘Healed by Metal!’ It’s so loud it makes you instantly want to bang your head. When Night Falls follows up stoiclly and will keep you on the edge of your seat as the tremendous pace of the main riff only offers a brief reprieve at the middle of the song. Lawbreaker starts off with a motorcycle revving before again thrusting you once more unto the breach to sing about breaking the law.

The album follows a pretty routine pattern from this point with most tracks having some sort of a guitar solo; a chorus which you could belt at the top of your lungs; and a drum line that’s as thunderous as that of a marching band. Matter of factly, the only tracks where this changes up are Call for War and Kill Ritual (the latter of which will stick in your head for a long time after listening to it) which offer an exciting change from the band’s ‘no frills’ approach to their music.

Power metal has always been a genre dominated by cheesy lyrics – fight the dragon, save the princess, soar like an eagle etc – and I’m not going to lie, but this album continues that cheesy trend – particularly on Ten Commandments of Metal, but it’s the anthemic nature of each track that just make the album enjoyable and something I can see blasting through festival campsites in Europe!

This won’t be an album that writes any records, but it is a decent addition to an already 18 strong album catalogue. If you are keen on 80’s-esque metal – traditional, triumphant and proud, then this is what you want to hear. I thoroughly enjoyed this release, but there isn’t much deviation on it from that 80’s metal sound. Grave Digger know the formula that works for them and hasn’t strayed from that path – but I guess if you’ve been making albums for over 30 years then you probably have a good idea on what works as a band and that’s where the strength lie in this album.

Band: Grave Digger
Album: Healed By Metal
Year: 2017
Genre: Heavy / Power Metal
Label: Napalm Records
Origin: Germany

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