Been There, Heard That and Batting a Thousand

This last round of blind purchases paid off in spades. Without ever having heard a note, I grabbed The Sword's Warp Riders, Eagle Claw's Poacher, Plector's Dark & Spiteful and Powerwolf's Lupus Dei thanks to three superb hard and heavy music blogs, Rockthought.com, New Wave of Thrash Metal and That Devil Music. Every single one of these mothers is a winner. A brief rundown of the best of the best and where each is leading me next:

Rockthought.com has not let me down yet. From Volbeat now to The Sword and Eagle Claw, they have now been responsible for the addition of six new records to my shelves and they're all keepers. I know from reading around as well as a few friendly emails that have come my way since the last post that I am about the last one to the party in terms of The Sword. If you've heard of them and haven't heard them, do not hesitate. Age of Winters and Gods of the Earth have been immediately added to my next purchase as Warp Riders is that good. To be honest, I haven't set back with the headphones and dug the concept storyline as there is an ass-kicking groove running throughout the record a notch or so above the average stoner plod that refuses to be denied. Then, as icing on the cake, Eagle Claw is, frankly, the shit. I recall a Neil Young comment from his drawn-out double-live odyssey, Year of the Horse, where he proclaims "It's all one song!" That's Poacher. And in the best possible way. It's a nice, lengthy record that never grows tired and never loses momentum while remaining heavy as hell.

Plector, whose Dark & Spiteful suggestion came from New Wave of Thrash Metal, is flat-out fun. This is in-your-face, loud and, as NWOTM stated in their post, a great blend of death and thrash. Dark & Spiteful is Plector's debut and their bio site states a new album and tours are in the works for 2011. I'll be watching.

The big, big payoff this time, though, was Powerwolf. Turns out I wasn't far off in my guess towards Blind Guardian and Powerwolf's Lupus Dei offers all the glorious excess Hansi Kürsch has applied to demons, dragons and wizards and instead settles in the domain of the Germanian/Romanian Werewolf. I have been thinking about this all day and have not yet come up with a way that this could be better without the addition of Vikings or pirates. Yes, the band themselves look more than a tad bit ridiculous but that's only because they were photographed in the daylight in human form. Sadly, it appears that none of their three albums (I just ordered Return in Bloodred and Bible of the Beast) are available domestically, so you'll have to wait for them to cross the ocean if you want them in the States. And trust me, you need them. Happily, Blood of the Saints is due in the USA on August 2nd.

Thanks to all these great sites - I continue to read your blogs daily and spread the word to anyone who will listen.  I still have Skindred's Union Black to hand out and will still be watching for suggestions through midnight tonight, June 10. And even beyond today, please keep emailing and commenting on new music to check out. There's more I'm bound to hate and give away later. Not this time, though..