There’s a lot to like about Primal Fear and their take on the sort of Metal Judas Priest have been making for decades, it’s raw, immediate and add in a bit of vintage Accept and you have the essence of the band. What you always get with Primal Fear though is quality, it might be derivative, it might be nothing new, it might be clichéd, but damn it’s good.
Opener ‘Angels of Mercy’ does the job of opening with a bluster so well, and ‘The End is Near’ chugs along nicely too, it might be back to basics but it’s a great song just like the anthemic ‘Bullets and Tears’ that ups the ante and lays on the biggest chorus yet.
Title track ‘Rulebreaker’ is more Hard Rocking and plenty of fun and sits nicely rubbing up against ‘In Metal We Trust’, before ‘We Walk Without Fear’ (which pushes 11 minutes) marches in and takes over, adding some real texture and great twists amongst some fine vocals.
By the half way point fans will be more than happy but the deeper you get the more you realise how solid these guys are: ‘At War with the World’ gets the fists pumping and ‘The Devil in Me’ rocks hard and slow almost like vintage Dio; whilst the powerful ‘Constant Heart’ sees the band at their most Priest-like.
With no room to get out of the way the contractual power ballad ‘The Sky is Burning’ lays on the big atmospherics and works incredibly well before the album rounds out with ‘Raving Mad’ which rocks us out hard and fast and possibly even leaves the best till last.
On an album that pulls no punches Primal Fear lets the music do the talking. 11 albums in this is how it should be done…
