THE 25 GREATEST POWER METAL ALBUMS
Initially, ‘power metal’ was just one of several interchangeable labels hanging around the early 80s underground to describe the intensification of metal beyond its 70s roots, towards a rougher, tougher, distilled strain of metal that reached for epic and fantastical themes. We can trace a line of inspiration back to the bespoke mythology of early Queen, Led Zeppelin’s Achilles Last Stand, Uriah Heep’s Demons & Wizards, Scorpions’ Taken By Force, Judas Priest circa Stained Class and Dio-era Sabbath, but it’s surely 1976’s Rainbow Rising that most prominently sired the medieval fixation, virtuoso musicianship and classical influences that became so key to the sound.
Key to its look was the Sword and Sorcery theme, enjoying a glorious pop-cultural boom with films like Dragonslayer, Excalibur and Conan The Barbarian, role-playing games like Dungeons & Dragons, Fighting Fantasy books and He-Man. Manowar were the most visibly heroic of a mighty USPM wave circa 1982-85, and a German scene was emerging in parallel, with Helloween, Grave Digger, Rage and Running Wild ratcheting up their New Wave Of British Heavy Metal influence. Meanwhile, Swedish neo-classical sensation Yngwie Malmsteen was setting new templates for young six-string obsessives.
For half of the 90s, the genre was shamed into hiding, while grunge, groove, alternative and death/black metal trends reigned. These were hard times for any who yearned for high-pitched vocal melodies about eagles and wizards. But with pride, skill, persistence and conviction, champions like Blind Guardian, Gamma Ray, Iced Earth and Stratovarius wrestled the genre back into the limelight. Their hard work paid off; when HammerFall, Rhapsody and Nightwish released debuts in 1997, the scene exploded.
Power metal remains a Marmite presence in our lives - Powerwolf, Sabaton and Gloryhammer inspire devotion and derision in equal measure - but its contribution to metal is inestimable. We celebrate 25 of the noblest artefacts in this or any other realm (though, in the name of bringing balance to said realm, only one album per band was allowed).
25-AVANTASIA
The Metal Opera (2001)
With Avantasia, multi-instrumentalist, vocalist and creative mastermind Tobias Sammet took the best speedy melodic metal from his main band Edguy and allied it to
