By Monk
It’s been five long years since we last opened the Astral Doors and transported ourselves into the power metal Überverse of these Swedish genre veterans, a hiatus which perhaps inevitably had us questioning if it indeed was #TheEndOfItAll for this project fronted by powerhouse vocalist Nils Patrik Johansson. But, we need not have feared the worst as, while the various band members have been off doing different things over the past half a decade they have now reunited to celebrate their coming of age with this, their ninth studio album in their storied 21-year career.
But, then again there is pethaps a prophetic twist to the album’s title, with the singer indicating that he may indeed be contemplating drawing a line in the sand in regard to this particular aspect of his musical adventures. If this is the case, then it goes some way towards explaining a lot of the introspection and retrospection which permeates this album, and gives it a feel of unfinished business finally and ultimately being completed, of a journey being completed and the final chapter being closed with an emphatic and satisfactory emphasis.
Opener ‘Temple Of Lies’ very much echoes the feel of Johansson’s 2020 solo album. ‘The Great Conspiracy‘, which extrapolated his fascination with the 1986 assassination of Swedish Prime Minister Olaf Palme, its winding density crafting the ultimate revelation that no one, never mind he, will ever get to the bottom of what happened, and acceptance of that inevitability delivered with a sense of relief of that burden being lifted from his shoulders. A chapter closed?
‘Iron Dome’ is more what we have come to expect from the power metal genre – big, brawny riffs overtopped with massive melodic hyperbolae that do not require the reviewing equivalent, with a punchy rhythm and soaring histrionics, both musically and instrumentally. ‘Vikings Rise’ is surprising deceptive, with its anthemic call to war underpinned by a massively tributary classic rock mien which recalls the love of RJD which Johansson had displayed on so much of his earlier work but on this occasion manages to subsume under a glossy faux-Nordic makeover.
Taking the album to the midway (sic) point is one of its most on point tracks, ‘Masters Of The Sky’, an unadulterated slice of pure NWoBHM-meets-Scandi-Teuton PM that would fit as comfortably in Accept’s early catalogue as it would that of Maiden or Sabaton, the aerial combat of its guitars strafing with the accuracy you would expect from trained gunners of this calibre, with Johansson delivering another particularly defiant vocal.
Another highlight is ‘When The Clock Strikes Midnight’, a massive slice of Helloween-esque hellaciousness which does exactly what you would exact, and this both getting your head banging right from the outset and your voice singing along to the simplistically infectious chorus line. Hey, why fuck with the formula? But, that’s what they then do with epic closer ‘A Game Of Terror’, which takes us back into the darker labyrinths of the album’s lyrical and musical maze with its combination of gothic ecstasy and majestic ebullience.
If this is indeed, as Johansson has hinted, the end of this particular journey and the closing of the doors forever, then it is a fitting way to do so, by delivering what exactly is expected but also throwing a few curve balls into the game which hopefully will make us come back and revisit this particular catalogue again in the future…
- ‘The End Of It All‘ is released on Friday 18 October.
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