Sanctuary - Inception

Published February 13 2017

*=Staff's pick	Dream Of The Incubus Die For My Sins* Soldiers Of Steel Death Rider/Third War White Rabbit Ascension To Destiny* Battle Angels I Am Insane* Veil Of Disguise

Genre	Heavy Metal	Warrel Dane	Vocals
Tracks	9	Lenny Rutledge	Guitar
Running time	42 Min.	Sean Blosl	Guitar
Label	Century Media	Jim Sheppard	Bass
Release	February 24, 2017	Dave Budbill	Drums
Country	USA	-	Keyboard
Producer	Chris "Zeuss" Harris
Similar bands	---

The Seattle metallers Sanctuary put out reworked demo material which for the most part eventually led up to their first album Refuge Denied. These early and once forgotten tapes were, reportedly, in pretty bad condition when they were discovered, with poor sound quality and some blank spaces, but after hard and persistent work, renowned producer Chris "Zeuss" Harris and the band were able to reintegrate the tapes and also further even improve the quality of those demo recordings.

Inception definitely has a more vibrant and powerful sound than what the debut record had. The guitars are louder and the whole thing feels revitalized, even if this outcome, in terms of production, possibly would have been almost the same if they had chosen to enhance Refuge Denied to such a large extent instead. Quite often when bands decide to remake or re-record songs several decades down the road of their career the result leaves you unaffected or even turns out utterly poor and an insult to the original stuff, but luckily this time it's quite the opposite because these songs certainly become stronger with more power added.

Warrel Dane's voice wasn't fully developed in the early days of Sanctuary and actually it wasn't until a couple of records into his tenure in Nevermore that his abilities first came in complete use and where he really proved to be a tremendous asset to whatever he laid down his vocals to. At this early point in his career he was often too high-pitched in his overall performance for no particular reason, so when he eventually started to come out with his deeper tone more frequently later on he instantly became one of metal's top names.

The boys in Sanctuary made some good songs early on and Die For My Sins is nothing but a super awesome track and one of the greatest songs ever made by this unit and by any band related to it. Nevertheless, my strongest impression of this effort is its superior sound quality in comparison to what Refuge Denied had to offer. The effect of the improvement of the sound can't be questioned, because it simply takes the songs to a whole different level of intensity. This record is a successful piece of studio work in my book and next time I want to listen to these old songs again, Inception will be my primary choice for sure.

See also review of: The Year The Sun Died

Performance	Originality	Production	Vocals	Songwriting
7	-	8	7	7

Summary
7 chalices of 10 - Tobbe