MANOWARS third album Hail to England followed on quickly from the ” Into Glory Ride album. Hail to England is a homage to both England, the country from which heavy metal originated and the fan base where the band first managed to build a following.
The album opens up with “Blood of my Enemies” and the sound instantly seems to be a bit fuller than previously. Definitely more solid sounding than their first album and a more complete sound too. This is a great song and well orchestrated. The song went to be come a staple of the bands live set over the years since this release. “Each Dawn I Die” follows on well from this as does “Kill With Power” another live classic from the first three songs we’ve got a much more focused and coherent band here. I’ve always thought on the first two albums there were some songs that just didn’t fit in, and kind of killed the mood a bit. This time no such mood killers, this is agressive, powerful metal played perfectly.
Performance the band is in top form, Eric Adams voice just pierces through your soul when he hits those high notes and the guitars are so precise its almost machine machine like.
“Hail to England” the song is performed in glorious New Wave of British Heavy Metal style mimicing Iron Maiden, a very fitting tribute mixed in with their own style. Manowar have now become masters of their craft. “Army of the Immortals” is another tribute to their fans (which, is great to see a band as loyal to their fans as these guys) and its also a tribute to this album that more than half of this seems to be played live at gigs to this very day. Next up is “Black Arrows” which is Joey’s chance to show off (masturbate) on his bass. Look the dude is good, one of the best really, but we’ve seen a few of these now, and while this is a cool bass solo, I’d hate to think we missed out on a song because of this when he could have put a shorter version of this in a song.
Lastly we have “Bridge of Death” which also starts off with a Joey DeMaio bass solo, but much more tasteful and leads into what is an epic track of heavy metal and an excellent way to close of the album. Manowar are a world beating band, that sometimes does get lost in it’s own pompousness but this album is solid the whole way through and a very pleasureable experience in very well crafted song smithing. I’d have to say up until this point, this is their best and most well rounded album.
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