Powerwolf - Return In Bloodred

*=Staff's pick	Mr. Sinister* We Came To Take Your Souls* Kiss Of The Cobra King* Black Mass Hysteria Demons & Diamonds Montecore The Evil Made Me Do It Lucifer In Starlight Son Of The Morning Star

Genre	Heavy Metal	Attila Dorn	Vocals
Tracks	9	Matthew Greywolf	Guitar
Runningtime	40 Min.	-	Guitar
Label	Metal Blade	Charles Greywolf	Bass
Release	04 April 2005	Stéfane Funèbre	Drums
Country	Germany	Falk Maria Schlegel	Keyboards
Similar artists	---

Powerwolf is a new band hailing from Germany and is based around the brothers Charles and Matthew Greywolf and the romanian singer Attila Dorn, who is a classically trained operasinger. There, however, stops the similarities with opera because his vocal performance in this band are of the rougher and powerful kind and they are very good, I might add.

Despite the very basic, old school riffs Powerwolf play and the simple nature of the songs, and the fact that the lyrics mainly deal with vampires, warewolves and ancient Romanian mystery, the atmosphere is initially almost "partyish", with slight uptempo bridges and choruses that make you think of a preparty before hitting the town later at night. That is especially significant in the three first songs Mr. Sinister, We Came To Take Your Souls and Kiss Of The Cobra King, and the latter song is even a minor hit in my ears. During these moments it's quite enjoyable, but unfortunatly it does not hold for a full album.

The tempo and the catchyness slowly but sure decreases along the way and sometime during the second half of the album the interest is down to a critically low level for me. It then turns into what they are promoting themselves as: epic and majestic metal. The tempo is from hereon pretty much constant with a standard pumping riff in the background and similar verses, so there are not many surprises or twists we are being served.

The times the tempo changes it is to the slower side, and hints of Ozzy and Black Sabbath and to some extent various stoner bands can be spotted (The Evil Made Me Do It, Lucifer In Starlight), but unfortunatly the songwriting is not good enough to lift the album even up to an average grade. The choruses sometimes hit a low mark level with just a monotone repeating of a few words and a lot of oh-oh-oh's, which is something that almost every song contain.

Enjoyable as the first album on the party as a warm-up for other albums perhaps, but not really as an album on its own. It will be interesting to see where they take it from here, because I hear and spot potential in some of the songs on the first half of the album but unfortunatly it withers and dies along the way. More varation and melodies as in the beginning of the album, then we're talking. But as for now it's a somewhat decent rock/metal album, not much else.

This might appeal to you if you are into epic, slower metal which hints of standard rock/metal, spiced with some catchy choruses from time to time. Check it out, and you might like it. I just think it's a bit too boring since the songs mostly do not go or lead anywhere. If you like it monotone and a bit mysterious, epic and gloomy - this might be the band for you.

See also review of: Blessed & Possessed , Preachers Of The Night
See also: Song By Song Commentary

Production	Vocals	Compositions
8	8	5

Summary
5,5 chalices of 10 - Tommy