DRAGONHEART – The Battle Sanctuary review

 DRAGONHEART – The Battle Sanctuary

Pitch Black Records

https://www.facebook.com/dragonheartofficial

The Brazilian metal scene, for those who know the southern American metal scene, is a scene that has quality with lots of talented bands that wait from the rest of the word to be discovered. Also, based on my opinion, the metal scene of this country is mainly inspired by the German metal scene. DRAGONHEART from Brazil is a band that I know from the past and actually I like a lot (I have purchased their sophomore album and also for a friend as a gift). So, I am really happy to see that the band is active and they will release 10 years after their last album their new work which has the title “The Battle Sanctuary”.

THE COVER: DRAGONHEART has always been a band with beautiful covers inspired by the realm of sword and sorcery (epic fantasy). The cover of the new album is also beautiful and consistent to the logic of the band. It is a painting of a warrior with a flaming sword fighting a demon and having behind him a creature looking like a living dead. It is a very vivid painting and full of colors. It is the kind of cover you can also see on a graphic novel book or even on a cover of a game. It is a cover that looks good, it is impressive and fits to the sound and lyrics of the band.   

MUSICAL STYLE: I am happy to see that DRAGONHEART, although the years have passed, have sustained the essence of their music and also have progressed. In a few words the band is moving musically on the heavy/power metal sound which mainly is influenced by Teutonic metal. In their previous album the band was sounding more as a good mix between GRAVE DIGGER, ACCEPT and HAMMERFALL. In their new release the band enters also the melodic fields of this sound and they brought to my mind the mid era of BLIND GUARDIAN. There are also some songs that remind me of the oldest era of the band and these are “Forged into Metal”, “Battle Lines” and “Kill the Leader”. Actually these songs are my favorite ones.   

CONCLUSION: It is nice to see that DRAGONHEART are back again and still close to their original sound. In my opinion, though, the heavy/power metal sound that is closer to ACCEPT and GRAVE DIGGER fits better to the band than the BLIND GUARDIAN feeling that is strong here. This is though a matter of opinion and choice…   

Nick “Verkaim” Parastatidis