Rock the Nations

While a guest appearance by Elton John doesn’t inspire much confidence in the ‘metalness’ of an album, don’t let that put you off or let the critics fool you. Rock the Nations doesn’t deviate as far from the quality or style of classic Saxon as some would have you believe.

In fact, this album is almost textbook Saxon. We have the standard songs about the glory of rock and roll, the obligatory head pounding, banner waving speed metal war epic, a sappy power ballad and the usual nonsense about motorcycles on the highway and sex with hot teenage girls.

Of course, this all flows about as well as cream cheese, but then Saxon have built an entire career on albums with no logical song progression whatsoever. All things considered, there’s a lot to like here. The riffs are chunky and catchy in equal measure, Biff is as powerful as ever, and the production, much like the band, is rock solid and workmanlike, if a little unspectacular.

While the band were rapidly losing relevance by this time in the face of the American thrash juggernaut (and this is hardly going to challenge Peace Sells or Master of Puppets for album of ’86), there’s still plenty of enjoyable, old school British heavy metal to be had here. It's by no means their finest hour, but definitely recommended for fans of the band or the style.