Album review: Battle Beast – Steelbound

Power metal acts are caught between a well-polished rock and a try-hard place nowadays. Lean too far into prospectively viral silliness and you'll be written off as a joke. Play it overly straight and you lose the sense of fun on which the genre thrives. Battle Beast’s greatest success with irresistible seventh album Steelbound is that there’s no such suffocating overthinking. Instead, the Finnish crew follow their cheesiest instincts to unabashedly joyous effect.

Cynics should move along post-haste. Evolved Pokémon-style from the simplistic silliness of 2011 debut Steel, Steelbound weaponises the same blend of pumping riffs, shredded guitars, overdriven synths and soaring vocals – featuring key-changes aplenty – with arena-seeking ruthlessness. Pyrotechnic opener The Burning Within sounds like Nightwish covering some forgotten banger from Disney’s Frozen. Here We Are is a festival anthem in waiting, with the genius simplicity of that colossal chorus (‘Here we are / Standing strong / Hand in hand / We carry on’) utterly undeniable. The outstanding title-track comes on like fucking ABBA stepping into denim and leather. Yes, that ridiculous. And that hopelessly irresistible.

Confidence pulsates through every song. Twilight Cabaret chucks in a spoonful of samba and a dash of Boney M before Last Goodbye unleashes enough power to get 100,000 fists pumping. The segue from 132-second orchestral interlude The Long Road into outrageously overblown highlight Blood Of Heroes would have even the mighty Sabaton thinking twice. Angel Of Midnight is a top drawer dancefloor-filler straight from the neon-streaked 1980s.

Chock full of poppy spark and changing it up often enough to never get bogged down, these 10 tracks fly by with a lightness of touch that’s rare in metal. Of course, the terminally straight-faced will be cringing themselves into oblivion as the Celtic flourish of Riders Of The Storm tumbles into lung-busting closer Watch The Skies Fall. But listeners willing to enjoy brilliant songwriting and virtuoso execution with a splash of syrup and side of cheddar will be rushing straight back to the start for another helping of iron-clad excellence.

Verdict: 4/5

For fans of: Nightwish, Within Temptation, Epica

Steelbound is released on October 17 via Nuclear Blast