One after the other new heavy metal band sees the light of day in Germany and Solemnity is no exception. The band is being promoted as heavy horror metal and combined with the total Manowar lookalike cover I get the impression that this will be another band that tries to recycle old Manowar songs. The cover is nevertheless impressive and the work of the famous fantasy artist Ken Kelly, who indeed is also responsible for Manowar’s cover art.

Surprisingly enough, Solemnity turns out to be a whole lot heavier than Manowar and combines old school heavy metal with old school thrash metal. Nevertheless the music is certainly nothing new and a myriad of influences can be heard in Solemnity’s music, ranging from Manowar and Metal Church to Helloween. Songs like “Solemnity” and “Reign In Hell” are classic and fast-speed heavy metal, while the aggressive “Open Fire” and ”Axekiller” are definitely more thrash oriented and remind for instance of old Metal Church and Megadeth.

The two best tracks on this album are the excellent ballad “Chalice Of Blood”, which shows that Solemnity can play more than just straightforward full speed heavy metal and the melodic “Walpurgisnight”. While the former reminds again strongly of Metal Church, the latter sounds more like Helloween with twin guitar solos and melodic vocals. Singer Sven The Axe (speaking of a corny name) fails to truly impress me however, and although he sounds brilliant at times, he nevertheless seems to have a lot of problems with the more melodic parts of the album.

The production of the album could have been a bit heavier and a bit more metal. Especially the guitars are too muffled but one should consider that this album has been produced and originally released by the band itself.

It is not the singer Sven The Axe nor the sound of the album that I find problematic, but it is the naive lyrics and the length of the album that bother me. Although Reign In Hell appears to have 66 songs and seems to last 66 minutes and 6 seconds, it is in reality only a little bit over half an hour long with only eight songs and one absolutely crappy hidden track called “Valpi”, which is nothing more than a horrific version of the song “Valpurgisnight”. The 66 tracks and the length of the album are an obvious reference to Satan and combined with some of the naive lyrics, Solemnity seem to be making fools out of themselves.

Reign In Hell is yet another good example of the German metal scene; it is nothing new but nevertheless it is very well played heavy metal. Considering the fact that the original bands like Manowar, Metal Church and Helloween have failed to deliver the goods for years already and simply seem to have lost all inspiration, one must just conclude that there certainly is a market for these bands. Any fan of bands like Grave Digger, Manowar and Sacred Steel will simply love this album and although I hope Solemnity will steer away from these corny lyrics, I just have to admit that this is a very decent debut album indeed!