MIDNIGHT RIDER – Manifestation Review

MIDNIGHT RIDER – Manifestation

Massacre Records

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There was a time, I mean a decade back and even more, that you couldn’t find easily a band playing 80’s inspired heavy metal. You had to do a deep search in the underground metal scene which was a really good and fulfilling thing to do. Years though have passed and now we live in an era when the 80’s metal inspired bands find you; you don’t need to seek for them. This is good, but there are too many such bands and from a point on they lower the quality bar. So, you need to be extra picky in order to find the ones that really sound authentic.

MIDNIGHT RIDER from Germany is a band that not only is influenced by the 70’s and early 80’s heavy metal sound, but somehow they have convinced me that they come from that era. In my opinion their sound has this British heavy metal touch and in specific they are majorly influenced by BLACK SABBATH and JUDAS PRIEST (“Rocka Rolla” and “Sad Wings of Destiny” era). Of course they also have an N.W.O.B.H.M. touch and there are times that they blend their sound with some hard rock references. The lyrics are also interesting because besides the common metal topics they deal with politics and such an example is the opening song with the title “When I Spew My Hate”.

I really loved the retro heavy metal sound of MIDNIGHT RIDER not only because they reminded me of the past days of the metal scene, but above all because they sound authentic and they have some really cool songs that I enjoy to listen to again and again.

Nick “Verkaim” Parastatidis