Grave Digger - Ballads of a Hangman [Album]
 

Grave Digger, if you weren’t aware, are a long-standing German Power Metal outfit. Having many line up changes over the years, Grave Digger’s only surviving original member is vocalist Chris Boltendahl, but considering they have been around for over 25 years it’s no surprise that there may have been some fallings out. Even though most of the members of Grave Digger are not originals, most of them boast around a decade's worth of time in the band. This is a hell of a lot longer than the life span many new bands could ever dream of having.

Ballads of a Hangman is Power Metal at its purist and most poignant, with a solid feel of competency and experience within the writing and playing. The songs do exactly what it says on the tin, if the tin you're looking at says Power Metal in big spiky letters. As you listen you can just picture long hair being thrashed around and arms adorned with various spiky leather wristbands, pumping in the air.

Grave Digger have shown, through Ballads of a Hangman, that they are still very on top of their game and can still write music that has that classic sound, yet making it sound like a new album. But being a band that was around in the breaking through of the genre, Grave Digger is able to continue that quality that they had originally produced back in the 80’s. It’s just nice to see that they haven’t fizzled out like so many other bands who peaked in the 80’s, in the breaking of their genre and have since spent the remainder of their careers trying to simply recreate the greatness they once had.


www.myspace.com/gravediggerclan