Stephen Long time singer, DC Cooper, finally went back to ROYAL HUNT after 13 years, a big hooray from the fans camp. He has a great vocal, I must admit, but sadly, I don't know why ROYAL HUNT's music didn't fascinate me much, perhaps because they're standing undecided in the middle of prog area and heavy metal, hence I can't really appreciate the big value of Cooper's contribution.

What offered here is basically an old time formula, for those who's familiar with Cooper's earlier era should find this easier to digest. Progressive metal with neoclassical element, but this time looks like they reduced the prog weight a bit and played with more straight forward heavy metal routine. 'One More Day' for example, this is symphonic and heavy metal combo while 'Another Man Down' started slow before building up the tempo, and both are pretty good track.

'An Empty Shell' is the weakest tune here but on the contrary, 'Half Past Loneliness' has the best chorus here and stands up as the greatest song. The sixth track, is the longest but the first half of the song didn't really grab my attention, but after the upbeat instrumental, I can see that this is not a bad track at all.

I found that this album probably will be enjoyed immensely by fans of Cooper and long time ROYAL HUNT fans, but to me, this is quite average and even the best track isn't really memorable by any stretch. You're okay with it, but in no time, it's traceless and you might completely forget about it. 65-70%

J-Man Royal Hunt has been consistently pumping out well-received melodic progressive metal albums for the past twenty years, and Show Me How to Live is certainly no exception to this trend. Although you could argue that the band's most creative and innovative period is behind them, these Danes still know how to dish out relevant and memorable music in today's melodic metal scene. Their blend of neo-classical instrumentation, melodic choruses, and hard-hitting riffs is inevitably lovable, and while Royal Hunt isn't nearly as original as they were in the mid-nineties', Show Me How to Live is still a fine effort that fans of melodic progressive metal ought to check out.

The main format for Royal Hunt's sound is melodic power metal with symphonic and neo-classical overtones, in addition to numerous ventures into progressive territory. This style may not be groundbreaking anymore in 2011, but Royal Hunt proves that they are still relevant by their compositional abilities and top-notch musicianship. This is a group of fantastic musicians across the board, and Show Me How to Live also sports plenty of killer songs. While the epic title track takes the cake by numerous country miles, everything you'll find on this album is well-composed and highly professional. Aside from the occasionally plastic keyboard tones (which, I guess could be a positive for some listeners), there's really not much to complain about on Show Me How to Live - it delivers plenty of goods, and while it rarely reaches a level of true excellency, this is a damn solid album from all fronts.

People who are hesitant to Royal Hunt's brand of symphonic melodic metal won't have their minds changed by Show Me How to Live, but fans of the band will be pleased to know that they have yet another solid platter of hard-hitting tunes up their sleeves this time. Although I would've liked a few more jaw-dropping moments like those found in the title track, it's still really tough to deny quality like this. 3.5 stars are well-deserved, and Royal Hunt fans would be making a mistake by passing this one up!

Conor Fynes 'Show Me How To Live' - Royal Hunt (7/10)

Royal Hunt takes an intriguing place as one of those legendary progressive metal bands that I have never heard about until recently. Having been around about as long as Dream \Theater, this band has been making their classically-influenced brand of progressive metal since the style was crawling on all fours. Over twenty years into their career now, the art of album-making is nothing new to these Danes, and 'Show Me How To Live' reflects that confidence and experience. With a firm grip on their melodic style, Royal Hunt creates an experience that is almost certain to impress lovers of both progressive and neoclassical metal.

As a newcomer to the music of Royal Hunt, the first band that this Danish act reminded me of were Kamelot. Although Royal Hunt predate Kamelot by years, their sound has developed into one that parallels the trend in neoclassical metal. Operatic 'power metal' vocals, symphonic keyboards, dramatic melodies and spitfire musicianship are all elements of Royal Hunt's music, and despite the fact that the style of music that this band plays is no longer 'my thing' so to speak, 'Show Me How To Live' has stood to me as a memorable album, solid in most respects. With the exception of the bold title track, the songwriting here is based in a hard rock tradition. While these songs are exciting enough to go off on instrumental escapades as per prog metal canon, they are centered around powerful choruses that reflect the band's skill with writing melodies, and depth of arrangement. The symphonic elements that Royal Hunt chooses to season their music with are never too elaborate, but adds a touch of extra class to what they do.

The largest qualm with Royal Hunt's sound is that while their neoclassical take on melodic metal may have been more adventurous back when the band was first starting out, Royal Hunt's established style is beginning to show signs of age. This album may be the band at their most professional-sounding, but by the second or third track of this record, little comes as a surprise. Regardless, 'Show Me How To Live' is a passionately performed and tastefully composed album by these underrated legends, and although Royal Hunt finds themselves amidst a sea of melodic metal soundalikes, they manage to stand out.

1967/ 1976 Sons of Rainbow the Danish band Royal Hunt is led by the extreme talent of the Russian keyboard wizard Andre Andersen, is an extreme interesting Tech Metal/ Melodic Symphonic Speed Prog Metal band. This 'Land Of Broken Hearts' is the 1st Royal Hunt studio album.

In this moment my CD player plays 'Age Gone Wild', a great Neoclassical power ballad but the previous song is 'Flight', a Power Speed song and another previous song is 'Easy Rider' a Power metal song. Said this what is the correct style of Royal Hunt? Maybe a sort of Neoclassical keyboard led Extreme Melodic Speed Power Symphonic Prog Metal? Well... (I'm embarassed)... Yes! Certainly, since Andre Anderson plays also the guitar this album have also great guitar parts. Evident the great voice of Henrik Brockman is more a Hard Rock voice and this is noticeable in 'One By One', a typical 80's USA Street/ Glam Metal song. 'Land Of Broken hearts' is not a pure Prog Metal album. The guitar parts are typically Prog Metal but the song are good examples of J.L. Turner Rainbow era style with more synths. This fact is not a defect because, I believe, the inclusion of parts 100% Power Mmetal or Speed Metal teach us that we are all debtors of the past and that if read correctly can be the subject of innovation (see 'Land Of Broken Hearts', a 100% J.L. Turner Rainbow era song [ballad] but 100% Prog Metal). But... For those who are advised to listen to an album of this kind? Well... For all who love Melodic Prog Metal, for who love AOR, for who love bands as Asia, Rainbow, Magnum. And in this sense I recommended the album versions with bonus tracks. In the re-released (with bonus tracks) are good 'Stranded' but magical are the acoustic versions of the same 'Stranded', 'Land Of Broken Hearts' and 'Age Gone Wild'.

In definitive if you love Neoclassical Extreme Melodic Speed Power Symphonic Prog Metal or simply bands like this or Angra or Narnia or Asia or Rainbow or Magnum, Royal Hunt is another great band for you and this 'Land Of Broken Hearts' well be an album that surely you love. All the songs are good and magical. Because Royal Hunt is a magical band.

The T 666 ROYAL HUNT is (was?) a very good band, sometimes standing near the threshold of greatness. The vocalist for the first albums was one of the most underrated singers in metal: D.C. Cooper. After he departed, John West of ARTENSION fame took his place and at first he really stood up to the challenge: he made a lot of fans forget the former's frontman departure. After a good debut album, "Fear", came "The Mission", a good effort. Then I lost track of this band for a while. I didn't get their latest (before this one), "Eyewitness", so my re-encounter with the Danish turned out to be "Paper Blood".

Now, ROYAL HUNT had always been characterized by a fast, driving style of progressive-metal, with a lot of classical influences (from the baroque era), some New Wave of british Heavy Metal (mainly MAIDEN) thrown into the mix, but all of that dominated not by the sound of guitars, but by the sound of keyboards. As Andre Andersen, keyboard player, is the true "owner" of this band (writes most of the music and lyrics), his instrument, until now, had been the prevalent one in all ROYAL HUNT albums.

But that keyboard-driven sound was a controlled, organized, melodious one. In the earlier records they used to have a lot of middle tempo songs with hard, heavy guitar riffs and powerful, heroic chords; sometimes the keyboards were used for atmosphere; when it came to soloing, you could hear every key and note that was being played, so crystal-clear and well-thought the Andersen solos used to be. "Paradox" was a masterpiece , "Fear" was a great follow-up.

But all of this is past history. "Paper Blood"'s ROYAL HUNT is a complete mess made of, almost exclusively, ultra-lightning fast songs; today's RH is just a bad power-speed metal band, with more predominance by the guitars than usual, and it's a shame because this was a keyboard band mainly. But at the same time, it is a sort of saving grace for RH that Andersen is no longer the only spotlight, for his playing today is just as irrelevant, muscular and no-brains as the music he's writing: light-speed solos where scales come and go, up and down. This album must hold the record for most scales per square minute, and a waste of minutes at that, for there's no melody in those solos, just boring scales.

Songs are very weak. No great choruses here in any of the tracks, no good verses... and John West... Where's the fantastic singer we had in the previous albums? He's just yelling, screaming, sustaining notes, there's no singing. But maybe it is not his fault, for he doesn't really have any melodic material to work with. The best track may well be the title track, if only because I remember how the chorus goes.

Atrocious. Terrible album for a band like Royal Hunt, with such talented musicians.