Luzifer – Iron Shackles (German Birthright Heavy Metal)
Nice. I say this not necessarily because this particular release is the greatest thing ever, but it’s definitely the greatest promo of this week. Man, yet again, I got slammed by some of the most banal submissions ever. Horrid cover art, or music so derivative and stale I thought it was old emails from ten years ago. It’s like an effect of COVID or something, I think. Bands just got boring because they couldn’t test their trash on live audiences. I thought this one was going to be as such too, but thankfully, since it’s like all the dudes from thrash outfit Vulture, that was probably not going to happen. Largely speaking it did not and I needed some classic heavy metal to review so here we go.
Luzifer plays an extremely traditional form of the stuff. That in itself defines most of Iron Shackles. From the “dawn of sword and sorcery” intro with war-cry shouting, clean-as-a-washed-and-combed-mullet bass lines, subdued drum marches, and the like, it’s an expected approach. Luzifer is highly skilled in what they do, they’re in fact masters of the craft, but what makes this one is the details. With their light touches of finely integrated keyboards, acoustics like medieval minstrels, absolutely breathtaking vocals, and other niceties, Luzifer is not here merely to play, they’re here to play with serious emphasis in the formatting. The lyrical themes are the expected fantasy bits, but this is completely eclipsed by their native tongue, when it appears. In the English segments it can fade into the background, but in German it sounds like a birthright. Overall, though, Iron Shackles is a fine heavy metal chunk when such details come together.
Written by Stanley, Devourer of Souls
Luzifer – Iron Shackles
High Roller Records
Cover Art: Velio Josto
4.3 / 5
