IGNITOR are returning back with their 8th full length album and four years after their very good album named ‘’The Golden Age of Black Magick’’ (2020). They celebrate this year, their 20-year discographic journey as a band.
For those out there, who happen to be not so quite familiar with IGNITOR, I will just mention that are a band from Texas, where the vocalist is Jason Mc Master, who appears also in the legendary debut of WATCHTOWER ‘’Energetic Disassembly’’ back in 1985.
The album is a pure manifest of USPM and classic heavy metal, as it should be played and has its roots defined in the ‘80’s. Actually, it sounds like it is deriving straight from those days.
The album title track ‘’Horns and Hammers’’, which is the first song of the record, is a perfect introduction of the whole album. Intricate – thunderous guitar work and riffing, galloping rhythm and a solid rhythm section leaded by the drummer Pat Doyle, which grabs the listener’s attention from the start. The high-pitched vocals are also impressive since the beginning. The atmosphere of the album starts really to ignite with the next track ‘’Imperial Bloodlines’’, which is a mid-paced song, with beautiful vocals and amazing guitar arrangements.
At this point, I’d like to stress out that Jason Mc Master has a quite impressive vocal sound spectrum. Sometimes his voice reminded me the mighty Ronnie James Dio in the more classic heavy metal parts of the songs and some other times it felt like I was listening to Rob Halford of JUDAS PRIEST or Tim ‘’Ripper’’ Owens. Mc Master is also capable to deliver some more aggressive elements with his voice, even growls except from the screaming vibratos. That is really remarkable and gives also a wide variety to the songs and make them more beautiful and more interesting.
The ferocious ‘’Dark Horse’’ is the third song, which continuous the streak of good songs. Slow and fierce, with a vibe of imminent tragedy in the beginning, catching fire and speed later, concluding to a dynamic soaring high pitched chorus and wonderful NWOBHM twin guitar harmonies from Robert Williams and Stuart Laurence, as the song progresses. ‘’Cyber Crush’’ has a more modern direction in some parts than the previous three songs but retains the interest at high levels.
Another highlight, named ‘’Shattered Crosses’’, follows and between non- and high-pitched singing, I felt I recalled JAG PANZER on one hand and ICED EARTH on the other. Next comes ‘’Taking Up with Serpents’’, which is another fine song.
The album continues with maybe my favorite song of the album ‘’Ferocious the Martyrs’’. When a song starts with an elegant bass line (by Billy Dansfiell), I believe nothing can go wrong from there and onwards. It has a dark melodic and ominous character, which gets really haunted in the middle of its six-and-a-half-minute duration, with the addition of Gabriel Guardian’s guest keyboards giving a pinch of a kind of mellotron organ sound.
‘’Suicide Anthem’’ and ‘’Chaos Maximus Eternal’’ are the final duet of vigorous songs of this album, with a little bit different emotion than the previous ones, offering the necessary de-escalation of tension in order to avoid monotony or fatigue. ‘’Terminus’’ is an outstanding instrumental track with an ambient black metal vibe and ‘’Hell Shall Be Your Home’’ is a live performance of a great song from the previous album, with a hooking melody of twin guitar harmonies.
The great cover artwork is by the renowned fantasy/sci-fi artist Claudio Bergamin and features a medieval warrior and his mighty steed surveying a hellish killing field. Bergamin is also the artist that created JUDAS PRIEST’s ‘’Firepower’’artwork and many others.
As a general overview, I found that album had really good songs. The content is rich, diverse, with plenty of elements to discover in each and every listening session. The band definitely had plenty of inspiration composing these songs, which I believe are the strongest ones up to now, in their discography.
That offers another reason for celebration on the occasion of their 20th year anniversary as a band, which is the presentation of their best album so far.
‘’Horns and Hammers’’ has been released on the 3rd of October 2024 by Metal on Metal Records and is available on CD and Digital format.
_____________________________________________________________________
Check the discussion about the album in our forum pages.
