Metal Debate Album Review - Gods Of Metal (All For Metal)

The Great Metal Debate Podcast

Welcome back to The Great Metal Debate podcast. Today we have another Metal Debate album review, looking at the new one from epic metallers All For Metal titled “Gods Of Metal.” Before we dive into specific tracks, I will highlight the aspect which really differentiates All For Metal, which is their use of two male vocalists who provide two different singing approaches. Antonio Calanna who gives traditional a power metal to hard rock vocal output along the lines of a David Bassin or Sozos Michael. Tim Schmidt gives us a baritone clean voice with false chord technique along the lines of what we’ve come to expect form Joakim from Sabaton. The album begins with an intro piece titled “Cry For Help” which has some building instrumentation and epic-sounding spoken words. The band ramps up the metal bluster to 1,000% on the second track and first full song, “Gods Of Metal.” The guitars are up front in the mix and provide some nice flourishes, although occasionally the keys push above them in the sonic spectrum. Track two is “Year Of The Dragon” and I freaking love this song! Maybe because I wasn’t expecting to hear this approach, it really resonated with me. As with the previous track the synths are a touch heavy throughout, but this helps dampen the effects that otherwise might have been too jarring It’s just a fun, upbeat track with verses that build and a singable chorus. “The Way Of The Samurai” didn’t work quite as well for me. Despite this Calanna’s voice is exceptional, and here he carries most of the vocal load with Schmidt coming in at points for emphasis. I especially liked Calanna’s brief falsetto accents in place. The guitars throughout are strong and display some good riffs, or perhaps they aren’t as diminished by keys as in the previous track. Everything builds to the chorus on “Temple Of Silence,” another strong guitar track. Schmidt’s voice is dominant for this song with Calanna giving brilliant accents. In contrast, on “When Monsters Roar” Calanna takes the first verse and Schmidt the second, with the two splitting duties including some fantastic harmonizing on the chorus. “Path Of The Brave” gives a classic power metal-ish ballad. Calanna’s singing is superb, but I wasn’t a fan of the orchestral melody. Just a touch too sugary for me. This was followed by “Like Thor And Loki,” which on first listen it struck that I hadn’t even notice we’d transitioned from an east Asian to a Norse aesthetic somewhere in the past few songs. The next one up is the synth-heavy “Valkyries In The Sky” featuring a strong vocal contribution from Laura Guldemond from Burning Witches. Guldemond is an insane singer and hell of a frontperson, and this song is constructed perfectly to highlight her voice. “Welcome To The Wasteland” returns to more standard All For Metal style with more trade-offs throughout by Schmidt and Calanna. But the chorus on this one is stellar – just a great melody and then with the double-bass kicking in a just the right time for extra emphasis and energy. Track 11 is “Who Wants To Live Forever” which features some great effort by both singers, outstanding orchestrations, and the twin guitars making it all work without overstepping their bounds. The album ends with “The Journey Will Not End” that matches the feel of the intro track. I really like how the band utilized Schmidt and Calanna’s voices in a variety of ways, mixing and matching them as was appropriate for each track. The songs were extremely well-written and every element of each track seemed to have some purpose to it. I have one critique: this album is way too overproduced and slick, at least for my taste. There’s no feel of rawness to the guitars, and even the sound of the orchestration is fat and soft. “Gods Of Metal” surprised me in a pleasant way, and the overproduction can be excused given the competent and engaging writing and performances. I’m giving “Gods Of Metal” an 8 out of 10 rating.