Rebellion

Arise: From Ginnungagap to Ragnarok - History of the Vikings, Vol. III

Written by: EW on 21/07/2009 19:13:56

One look at Rebellion's last.fm page should reveal most of what you need to know about this German heavy/power metal band. Similar acts including Mystic Prophecy, Stormwarrior, Paragon, Wizard and Metalium suggest that Rebellion are as to the German metal scene as one foot slogger was to the massive German army of World War II - little of individuality, one of many, in a powerful collective. This glance however doesn't reveal that "Arise: From Ginnungagap to Ragnarok - History of the Vikings, Vol. III" is the final part of the band's trilogy relating to the history of everyone's favourite ancestors, the Vikings, and is also infact a better album than much of what I've heard from many of their teutonic Brüder aus metal.

This is my first experience of Rebellion but the sound can be succinctly described as sitting as the crossroads between a bass-heavy Iced Earth mixed with some of the stomp of Amon Amarth and your typical German metallic glory. Rebellion were actually formed following the departure of Uwe Lulis and Tomi Göttlich from Grave Digger, though thankfully there is more bite to be found here than in their previous counterparts. "Runes" is the simple example to demonstrate the Rebellion template on "Arise..."; galloping and glorious with a confident singer in Michael Seifert often found to be leading the procession in his delivery of Maiden-esque chorusses sandwiched in between pleasantly good, if non-descript, heavy/power metal riffs. Unlike recent albums such as Mystic Prophecy and Narnia's, Rebellion score greater points simply for the fact their rhythmic riffs are a pleasant enough listen for a non-German rather than the cack-handed boring attempts at song-writing those other bands (as two examples of many) provide for us.

As if you were waiting for it, its not total patch jacket beer majesty that I'm sure many others will review "Arise" as. At the peak of each song the feeling of de javu is over-whelming. I'm sure the chorus' of "Odin" and "Runes" are the same and in a more general sense, the chest-out manliness (predominantly through the lyrics) throughout can be both admired and chuckled at, depending on your inclination towards such things.

At times like this I wish I was German and got their extreme heavy metal passion, just to see if I would appreciate "Arise..." anymore. Though I'm not sure if being English is any better these days I'll have to settle for what I've got and tell you that "Arise..." is good; better than most in it's field in fact but not likely to make you complete that long-awaited dream move to the Fatherland.

7

Download: Runes, Thor, Einherjar
For The Fans Of: Gamma Ray, Primal Fear, Stormwarrior
Listen: Myspace

Release date: 24.07.09
Massacre Records

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