  
Battle Beast are a Finnish band who released their debut album, Steel in April 2011 through Hype Records. Sadly the album was only released in Finland, but the band have now signed a deal for Nuclear Blast to release the album throughout the rest of the world.
Battle Beast have supported Blaze Bayley in Finland and after winning the WOA: Metal Battle in Finland they got to play the Wacken Open Air festival in Germany which is sure to have made them some new fans. They will be playing across continental Europe in the spring as they have been announced as support for Nightwish.
If you've noticed that Battle Beast have a female singer, you may assume that since they are supporting Nightwish on their European tour then they must be symphonic metal. Well that's a reasonable assumption but it's totally wrong - Battle Beast play classic heavy metal. Singer Nitte Valo has a fantastic voice for this type of music producing some amazingly powerful screams at time that would put Bruce Dickinson to shame.
The album kicks off with "Enter the metal world" - a really strong metal track that in my opinion is the best track on the album.
"Savage and saint" is a slower more gentle melodic track, but you get the impression as you listen that Nitte is barely managing to restrain her vocals, then halfway through the song she lets rip with full power and the music steps up a level to a more normal metal sound. The transition between the two halves of the song works really well and gives the album some nice variety.
"Iron hand" shows some more variety with a short section featuring operatic vocals in addition to the normal metal vocals
Battle Beast have made a great classic heavy metal album with "Steel", and it's going to win them a lot of new fans around the world. A great album that's well worth buying.
"Steel" will be released on 30th January 2012 through Nuclear Blast.
Track listing:
1. Enter the metal world
2. Armageddon clan
3. The band of the hawk
4. Justice and metal
5. Steel
6. Die-hard warrior
7. Cyberspace
8. Show me how to die
9. Savage and saint
10. Iron hand
11. Victory |
