progshine Dragonforce is the perfect band for the 00 generation, the generation that already born with computers and cell phones.

Why I say that? Simple! Sonic Firestorm and all their discography, is like a computer joke, a Ctrl+C Ctrl+V in every well known song by every well known power metal band from the 90's, but of course, with a little 'speed' up, cause you know, it's like a picture nowadays, withouth Photoshop it's not a real picture. Way more cool if it's really fast.

It's funny how in the end of the day, great 70's musicians like Ritchie Blackmore turn out to be the 80's Yngwie Malmsteens and they became Stratovarius and Gamma Rays in the 90's and were followed by Dragonforce in 00's.

It would be really funny if it wouldn't really tragic.

UMUR Ultra Beatdown is the 4th full-length studio album by UK/ Multi-national power metal act DragonForce. The album was released in August 2008 by Roadrunner Records. The band achived great success with the 2006 Noise Records released Inhuman Rampage album and was picked up by Roadrunner Records for this release. Ultra Beatdown has seen both a CD and a vinyl release. There´s a limited CD edition available with 2 bonus tracks and a Japanese version with 3 bonus tracks.

The music on the album is Euro power metal usually played in a fierce pace. So in that respect not much has changed since Inhuman Rampage. Upon closer examination Ultra Beatdown offers up a bit more variation than its predecessor though. The pace is actually lowered a couple of times and there´s generally a better dynamic in the music than was the case on Inhuman Rampage. But fans of ultra fast Euro power metal shouldn´t despair though, DragonForce are still one of the fastest playing bands in the genre. Some of the tracks on this album are designed to take your breath away and leave you awstrucken. Speed, speed and more speed.

Some people might find the uplifting and light spirit of Euro power metal cheecy and a bit too much and personally I´m not always in the mood to listen to music like this, but when it works it works wonders and DragonForce prove once again with Ultra Beatdown that they are one of the leading forces in the genre. One of the greatest assests of the band is of course their exceptional musicianship, but with an excellent polished production and improved and more memorable songwriting, the band are also developing their sound and thereby proving that they are not just content with the virtuoso label. They also want to be recognised as composers. This is an ambitious act and I´m glad they´ve managed to put a bit more variation into their sound compared to earlier releases. Ultra Beatdown deserves a 4 star rating.

UMUR Inhuman Rampage is the 3rd full-length studio album by UK/ Multi-national power metal act DragonForce. The album was released in January 2006 by Noise Records. I haven´t listened to the two previous albums by the band so Inhuman Rampage was my introduction to DragonForce. As far as I understand it´s also the album that gave the band their breakthrough. The band members come from all over the world but the base is in UK, London.

The music on the album is Euro power metal played with exceptional virtuosity and speed. Out of the 8 tracks on the album it´s only album closer, the epic power ballad Trail of Broken Hearts, where the pace is lowered. All other tracks on the album are played in a fierce pace. The drums even play what I would characterize as blast beats at times. While the pace in Euro metal metal is usually very high, it´s seldom you´ll hear blast beats. A very nice feature IMO. Everything on this album, from the dual guitar attack to the keyboards to the fast played rythms, are performed to the maximum of the players abilities. The vocals by ZP Theart are probably the least over the top thing on the album, and they are still very well performed. This album is all about speed, speed and more speed. Think the fastest played tracks by artists like Helloween and Sonata Arctica and you´re just about there.

The songs are very melodic with hook laden chorus lines and re-occuring instrumental themes, so in that department Inhuman Rampage isn´t an out of the ordinaly power metal release. And that´s probably a minor weakness on the album. The melodies don´t stand out as being very original and thereby Inhuman Rampage rely much on the virtuosic playing by the members of the band and less on the compositions themselves. This is not always a problem though ( we can´t all invent the wheel) and while the music on the album isn´t exactly original, the incredible playing, the powerful polished production and the solid songwriting, ensure that this is still a very succesful album to my ears. It´s one long funride and even though it has a tendency to become a bit too pompous ( read: cheecy) there´s always a gleam in the eye that ensures that the album is entertaining all the way through. I can´t remember having this much fun with a power metal album in a long time. So if you´re anything like me and mostly enjoy the really fast played tracks on Euro power metal releases I can highly recommend Inhuman Rampage. A 3.5 - 4 star rating is warranted. Just great fun this one.

Valarius With the obvious talent and potential to become one of the greatest Power Metal bands of all time, the thing that makes Dragonforce stand out the most is also the thing that annoys me about them. They’re too fast.

‘Valley of the Damned’ has a very promising start, with the title track producing some very nice riffs, accompanied by some incredibly catchy vocals, however, this is as good as it gets, as halfway through the song the band, in particular, guitarists Sam Totman and Herman Li, decide to disregard any logical tune and just shred away. It quickly becomes apparent that this is the formula for all their songs.

With bands such as Dream Theater and Symphony X being top influences of mine, it’s clear that shredding isn’t a problem for me. What bothers me when Dragonforce start wailing away, is that it’s so fast and flashy that there is no distinguishable melody. Every solo, and I mean EVERY solo, sounds exactly the same, and by that I mean a flurry of notes so fast you can’t make any of it out.

Sadly this is the case with all of their tunes, with more focus on speed and energy rather than songwriting, the vocals are the only recognizable melody that you can ever hope to hum along to.

It’s a shame, because this band has a hell of a lot of potential, and in the very few cases when they do slow down their music is awesome. Songs like ‘Valley of the Damned’ and ‘Disciples of Babylon’ have some really kickass moments, but then descend into the standard Dragonforce routine of ruining a perfectly good song.

As a fan of shred guitar playing, it saddens me to say this, but in the case with this band, ‘Speed Kills’.