Do you still remember the excellent Helloween debut album Walls Of Jericho from 1985 with Kai Hansen on vocals instead of Michael Kiske? The straightforward, aggressive and raw heavy metal that smashed on and on without pause in an almost playful yet sublime manner. Don’t you just wish sometimes that those days would come back when listening to the current new wave of weak heavy metal? If so, then you will be very pleased to hear that Stormwarrior shares your feelings. After the brief spoken intro, “The Hammer Returneth”, Stormwarrior literally smashes into “Signe Of The Warlorde” and only one feeling dominates you: this is the Helloween of old! Even better examples are the seventh song “Death By The Blade” and the tenth song “Defenders Of Metal”, which feature some excellent ‘Weikath-Hansen’ type of twin guitar solos that just have Helloween written all over them.

Oh hell, this has been done before but nowadays almost all the heavy metal albums I listen to seriously lack originality, but I guess in a scene that has been around for 30 years it is not so much originality anymore that counts but conviction and diversity. Conviction is exactly the one thing Stormwarrior certainly doesn’t lack. Aggressive and lightning fast twin guitar riffs are driven by fast paced drumming and all the while singer Thunder Axe screams his lungs out in a manner that certainly reminds of Kai Hansen, although with slightly more power.

“Stormwarrior” is just filled with excellent full speed heavy metal songs and there’s barely any moment to catch your breath.

And that is exactly my only problem with this album; after a few songs everything starts to sound the same. Especially considering the fact that all the songs have very straightforward choruses with standard backing vocals. Normally these choruses are the true power of bands like Helloween and heavy metal bands in general but once every chorus starts sounding the same it tends to get boring quickly. One of the few exceptions is the song “Chains Of Slavery” which features Kai Hansen himself on vocals and guitars! This song is slightly more diverse and Kai Hansen’s vocals add a special touch to the song. It should however be mentioned that guitarist and singer Thunder Axe has written all the songs himself.

No one less than Kai Hansen has produced the album and the sound is as metal as it gets! Add to that a more than excellent live bonus track, the Helloween cover “Heavy Metal (Is The Law)”, which is of course taken from Walls Of Jericho and you can only conclude this album is an absolute must for anyone who loves old Helloween. If that still hasn’t convinced you, what about the fact that Kai Hansen and Markus Großkopf can both be heard on the live bonus track?

This album deserves an absolute 10 for effort but unfortunately it is slightly too predictable. Nevertheless it is truly wonderful to hear the rebirth of Helloween; and albeit it is not Helloween themselves, it is as close as it gets!