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Helloween return home with Nuclear Blast

Posted in News with tags Dark Ride, Germany, Hamburg, Helloween, Nuclear Blast, Power Metal, Rabbit Don't Come Easy, Straight out of Hell on 25th March 2014 by Nico Solheim-Davidson, the North Sea Poet

Hailing from Germany, Helloween have been an influential driving force on the power metal scene for 30 years, as well as one of the most internationally successful acts. This year, the Hamburg-based quintet celebrate their 30th anniversary. The band’s latest studio album Straight Out Of Hell, charted at a sensational #4 in Germany, and held their position for five weeks. Additionally they made another five top ten entries in Europe and also cracked the US Billboard Charts.

Now the Teutonic power metal force have returned to their old label home, Nuclear Blast, where the band released 2000’s The Dark Ride and 2003’s Rabbit Don’t Come Easy. Both of these albums have been recently reissued with additional bonus content. Label owner Markus Staiger comments:

We are more than proud, that Helloween is part of the Nuclear Blast family again. All those years we had a friendship-like connection and ways crossed on a regular basis at concerts and festivals. Helloween to us is a matter of the heart, there’s not only the two records to mention, but an act that influenced me and many of our employees. Together there are big plans and we are looking forward to having another productive and successful cooperation.

Helloween’s vocalist Andy Deris also adds:

As a label, Nuclear Blast is “heavy metal to the bone”, and we are really looking forward to working together with a lot of familiar faces.

Helloween online:

http://helloween.org I
http://facebook.com/helloweenofficial

Helloween – Straight out of Hell

Posted in Uncategorized with tags Blind Guardian, German, Grave Digger, Helloween, Metal, Michael Weikath, Power Metal, Straight out of Hell, Time of the Oath on 20th May 2013 by Paul

Helloween
Straight out of Hell
Released January 16^th, 2013
Power/Speed Metal
Released via Sony Music Entertainment Germany GmbH

Along with Blind Guardian and Grave Digger, Helloween are one of the longest running and most prolific bands of the German Power Metal scene. Their career is a textbook example of the journey that many metal bands go through. Their first album, Walls of Jericho was a highly acclaimed debut that shortly followed by the band’s masterpieces: The Keeper of the Seven Keys parts 1 and 2. In typical eighties Metal band style, the group entered their second decade of existence with an awkward experimental phase in the early nineties, recording Pink Bubbles Go Ape and Chameleon, to far less success and acclaim than their previous releases. After this, the band bounced back with The Time of the Oath and Better than Raw and have since settled into a more stable pattern of creating a decent album every few years for the last decade or so. This brings us to 2013 and Straight out of Hell.

What should listeners expect of this album? It’s a solid effort from a mostly solid band. Worth at least a listen or two, the record features a relatively diverse amount of songs that showcase Helloween’s great style. Fast songs, slower songs, the epic 7 minute opener, anthemic songs and a decent sprinkling of the band’s trademark eccentric humour for good measure make up this record. Some album highlights include Far From The Stars, Church Breaks Down, the title track Straight out of Hell, the gloriously cheesy Hold Me in Your Arms and the epic starter track Nabatea. This is a reliably good record that should sit comfortably in the collection of any Helloween fan, but also any fan of modern Power Metal. With typical Maideneque song writing that has so often defined the band, soaring choruses and epic, neoclassical elements, this album is proof that Helloween can still write some entertaining songs.

3.5/5

Paul Gibbins