Dragonheart
The Battle Sanctuary

Fans of Brazilian band Dragonheart have been waiting a long time for this album, over ten years have passed since their latest effort but now they are back with an album called The Battle Sanctuary. It is their fourth album and it features a dramatic cover artwork and a logo that doesn’t feel particularly original. Then again, you should never judge a book by its cover and there are some strong Brazilian bands within this genre so this might be one of them that just have been flying under my radar this far.

Musically this album stands on the power- or heavy metal foundation. Quite heavy and with a vocalist that does not sing in the high pitch style like some other vocalists in the genre, I think he is somewhat limited in vocal range but they write their songs to fit that quite well. Relatively varied without stepping out of the bounds, they seem a little bit too rooted in the past to appear novel. If you are looking for novelty you should look elsewhere as these guys press the common buttons and seems to be generally looking to appeal to fans of the genre rather than make music that breaks new ground. The production is okay, maybe slightly dated but nothing that is particularly detrimental to the album as a whole. Perhaps a bit problematic with the playing time reaching almost one hour, one can see it as a bit long.

I think that overall this is a decent album but it has been hard writing about it, mostly due to its lack of novelty and originality. It was troublesome deciding how to rate this album, three or four were my choices and I could have gone both ways considering that I do not hate the album. I think there are some strong points of it but the overall feel of the album is that I think it lacks something, and that something is a sense of novelty and that is something that is important if you want to make an exciting new album. Fans of heavy metal and of the band will probably not be too disappointed though, I think it will work for them.

Just to touch on the songs before leaving this band and this album, the fifth track feels very stolen, I will not say from where but it reminds me a lot of something from 1986. The songs are quite typical heavy metal songs and none of them really stand out, perhaps the title track is the best but it is difficult to really say, I don’t think the album really speaks to me. It is a decent effort but I don’t really think it is that interesting.

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