Hammerforce – Access Denied (2013)
Metalism Records -- Running Time 51:00

Hammerforce have returned with their sophomore album ‘Access Denied’ and for anyone unfamiliar with their sound and who has to have a genre tag, I have taken it upon myself to give them the title ‘Twisted Power Metal’. Hailing from St. Petersburg in Russia, Hammerforce are one of a handful of bands, I can think of, who are breathing fresh life into the power metal genre and if you crave something a little bit different then these guys come highly recommended!

Why do I call them twisted? Well, they are essentially an extremely good power metal band at heart, and possess all the good elements of that genre in spades. Soaring vocals, powerhouse drumming and bass runs with fantastic guitar work, but...where they stand out from legions of other bands is in the keyboard department. ‘Nikita Merzlyakov’ delivers some quite stunning work. If you can imagine synth work in an almost dance/trance style mixed with classic power metal you’ll find something that really shouldn’t work, or so I keep telling myself, but in actual fact adds an outstanding clash of styles, especially for a huge fan of the genre, like myself.

The album kicks off with ‘I Am I’ and leaves you in no doubt that this is going to be a pretty special listen. Picking out individual tracks is pointless though, because most of them follow a similar pattern, although that doesn’t mean they all sound alike, far from it. There are some great melodies and choruses contained here that will have fans of Dream Theater, Symphony X, Pagan’s Mind and Dragonforce jumping and headbanging for all that they are worth. There are also elements of classic metal bands such as Judas Priest, so anyone who thinks I’ve lost my mind will very definitely know what side of the fence Hammerforce sit on. Fantastically produced, mixed and mastered by Nikita at his own studio, and with artwork and booklet to put much bigger bands to shame, ‘Access Denied’ is nine tracks (plus two bonus cuts sung in Russian) of awesome catchy metal that should really see the ‘Hammerforce’ name spoken by many more people in the coming months. Check out their website, which gives you access to lots of free songs and see what you’ve been missing!



https://www.facebook.com/Hammerforceband
http://hammerforce.ru/release.html



Written exclusively for Brutiful Entertainment by Rick Tilley: https://www.facebook.com/richard.tilley.351