adg211288 Vainglory’s second album, released in 2007, quite some time since their debut effort 2050 which was released in 2001, brings many changes. First and most prominent is that the original singer, Ted Brasier, has been replaced by a woman, Kate French (also in Chastain), and their music has drifted from a power metal sound to traditional heavy metal, with some influence of speed metal. And it’s a winner in all aspects.

Let’s start with the singer change. Due to drastic difference in the tone of voice, replacing a male vocalist with a female one (and vice versa) is rarely going to work. There are however exceptions are this is one of them, as French sings in a a traditional heavy metal style that has true power behind it, and she also proves herself capable of calmer more melodic vocals for the lighter sections in the track Undying Love, although quieter sections are not common on this album. I’m very impressed by her vocals actually, they’re the main factor as to why I like this album so much, although its other merits are high as well, the genre change not least among them as this showcases a band that have really found their sound and with the song-writing to back it up, this is nothing less than one of the best metal releases of 2007.

The music of the album is written by Corbin King (lyrics are primarily by Kate French, sometimes in collaboration with King), the lead guitarist and he keeps it strong throughout. Vainglory is very much a metal album and King keeps the band going at full force through most of the album, only slowing down during some sections of Undying Love, which is the closest to a ballad that you’ll get on this album. There are twelve tracks, one of which is instrumental (Decapitation Attack), and showcases King’s guitar playing skills without being an indulgence into such things. In short it fits within the album just as well as any of the eleven vocal tracks.

Highlights of the album start from the off, with the excellent Walking Dead. This song was made to headbang to. It is followed by Burdened, a shorter but no less intense piece of metal. However it is a later track, Endlessly, that is the true gem of the album. As I said previously it is the vocals that draw me to this band. While female vocalists in metal are much more common than they once were, ones of French’s style and quality are few and far between and to get an album with such strong writing on top of this has produced a real masterwork of metal music.

While it is true that Vainglory don't really bring anything new to the table with this album since it's a fairly standard approach at the end of day to many other bands playing traditional heavy metal, with the only variation in the mould being that they're one of the minority that has a female vocalist, it's a very solid example of a tried and tested formula, which, really, should appeal to the majority of metal fans, even those who tend to steer clear of female fronted metal because they're sick of operatic types or perhaps more specifically, Nightwish clones because you won't find such a band here. It doesn't get more metal than this and I very highly recommend it.

(Review originally written for Heavy Metal Haven)