Shadows of Steel

Oh boy, it's very hard to defend this. Wild Steel was not blessed with the angelic and overtly dramatic voice that he always longed for so much, it's a rather draining hoot, a collection of weird and odd wailing in the region of second rate Italian power metal architectures. But here is the thing: it's fucking charming nonetheless. What this man lacks in god given genetics, he makes up for with passionate theatrics and incorruptible endurance. It's like watching a fine b movie with William Holden that offers character where it lacks class and substance. To me, the voice of Wild Steel will always be an important part of the Italian power metal scene of the millennium days. Needless to say that Shadows of Steel were running alone when most of the other bands weren't even formed.

It's a wild mixture of semi catchy power metal, soloing progressive metal and italo pop desperation and I don't think that there was another band that combined the phantom of the opera with some dirty and pumped up underground tunes like this one. Shadows of Steel were never on the track to stardom because the vocals were just too damn strange and the choruses lacked easy accessibility. But you can find the tried and true Italian power metal feeling on this album for sure. It's no wonder that these guys were pals with the fellas from Labyrinth, although Shadows of Steel were always a bit more complex and less straight forward.

As much as I hated playful progressive sections all my life and especially in power metal (Fuck very you, Symphony X!), I have to say that many parts of this record got me hooked. The playful sessions of speedy keyboard runs and drawn out guitar rides have a genuine feeling of simple joy to them. These parts were not made to impress you, they are just present to dance away. I like that, it offers the simple fun of tunes without the subtext of pretension. Most of the time it feels like you are sitting in the moonlight, next to a well in a small Italian city while a mentally challenged bard with a loaded gun in his belt is trying to entertain you. It's not always art, but music for sure.

There is something wonderful about the fact that a bad singer with a good heart released an intriguing album like that back in the day, it's rather unthinkable that someone would dare doing this nowadays without getting ridiculed for it. Shadows of Steel do have a cult following around the world and it is most certainly earned. This power metal will never be famed and carved in stone, but it represents a successful communication between artist and fan and that is worth a lot.