Rising, appropriately enough, from the steel mills of Allentown, PA,
Sinister Realm live, breathe, and probably even eat heavy metal, and their eponymous debut of 2009 imparts this truth without any reservations or roundabouts. Its songs are replete with meaty guitar riffs topped by ringing dual harmony parts (and even the occasional, restrained keyboard) to erect a towering smokestack spewing a viscous, dramatic brand of classic ‘80s metal akin to vintage
Dio,
Manilla Road,
Metal Church, and
Manowar (mercifully, minus the leggings and thongs!). In fact, singer Alex Kristof's histrionic, vibrato-laden baritone is quite reminiscent of Eric Adams (also Tim "Ripper" Owens, at times), and thus are perfectly suited to sell the epic adventure lyrics gracing anthemic tracks like "(The Oracle) Into the Depths of Hell," "The Demon Seed," and "The Nihilist." A few vestiges of bassist and bandleader John Gaffney's previous concern, the long-running doom outfit
Pale Divine, help explain a set of more deliberate offerings like "Machine God," "Message from Beyond," and "March of the Damned," but these aren't disappointing in any way -- just not quite as virile and exciting as their more energized counterparts. And despite a few less fully realized second-half offerings ("Mongol Horde," the instrumental "Enter the Sinister Realm"), there's an all-binding cohesion of vision and sonic legitimacy to these cuts that makes them nearly irresistible to listeners long ago seduced by the heavy metal's fundamental sonic hallmarks. ~ Eduardo Rivadavia