VARIOUS ARTISTS - Sons Of A Dream - A Tribute To The Majesty Of Warlord (Metal Breed Records USA)

Finally the long awaited tribute album to US Melodic / Epic / Power Metallers Warlord has been released by Metal Breed Records in two editions: as a digital release (which is already out) and as a CD (which is on the way).

Metal Breed Records USA is proud to announce the release of the highly anticipated "Sons Of A Dream", the first commercially available Warlord Tribute Album officially endorsed by the band.

Warlord is one of these bands that have influencedthe development and evolution of Heavy Metal music in various of tis genres and this tribute album is a big proof of this fact. The listener will notice many bands form different genres of Metal taking part in this tribute album covering the tunes of Warlord: from AOR and Hard Rock genres to neoclassical, Epic and Power Metal the passion, love and respect for the music of William J. Tsamis is expressed by all of the bands participating on this tribute. 

Artists from places like Australia, Puerto Rico, Italy, Germany, Cyprus and of course Greece are joining forces in this album. You will not be surprised to learn that in this album the personal bands of two Warlord singers are featured: Current Warlord frontman Nicholas Leptos' band Arrayan Path and former live singer Giles Lavery's Dragonsclaw are covering the masters. There are also two female singers featured: Fofi Roussos an Iowa, USA native and Moja Nardelli hailing from Düsseldorf, Deutschland, whose renditions of classic Warlord compositions "Penny For A Poor Man" and 'My Name Is Man" can only be described as excellent.

The album contains 11 tracks (10 on digital format). So lets see the songs and the band that appearing on the album: "Deliver Us From Evil" is performed by BattleroaR (this one would appear on the CD edition only), well this is a calling into battle and I can not think about a more suitable band to cover it, their version is great with respect to the original. 

"Winter Tears" is performed by Bob Katsionis, this is one of the greatest tunes in here, excellent arrangements, great vocals as already pointed. "Child Of The Damned" is performed by Angelo Perlepes' Mystery, in this cover the Greek guitar maestro has put all his talent in this one, fantastic guitar work, this is a raw, powerful version of the Warlord's classic. 

"Mrs Victoria" is performed by Arrayan Path, well this is one of my favorites, Leptos has done excellent work on vocals adding a more "exotic and mysterious" touch to the most haunted track that Warlord have ever recorded. "Penny For A Poor Man" is performed by 4Bitten and they have actually given a more Hard Rock vibe to the tune mainly thanks to the vocals. It sounded a little strange to me on the first listening but on the end I liked it. 

"Black Mass" is performed by Innerwish, who have managed to deliver a real majestic version of one of Warlord's darkest songs. "Lucifer's Hammer" is performed by Dragonsclaw who are transferring the vibe of the original very well thanks to the excellent guitar work and the vocals. 

"Lost And Lonely Days" is performed by Delivers is brought to us with a little AORish touch thanks to the vocals, they are even expanding the song a little adding some extra guitar phrases before the main lead, not bad at all. "Winds Of Thor" is performed by Dexter Ward is sounding as you may expect: epic. 

The two last songs of the tribute are "My Name Is Man" which is performed by Blacklands on a dreamy version -one of my favorites on this tribute-  and "Sons Of A Dream" which is performed by Dark Nova, well the Greek Metallers have offered a fantastic version of the tune adding their Neoclassical touch into it, really great.

All the bands have done their best to pay tribute to the greater Metal band in the world. This is something that each and every listener would realize, listening each and every tune.

The production is great, doing justice to the tracks included: Main engineering and mastering took place in Studio R-Mic in Athens, Greece under the care of Warlord 2013 Tour sound engineer Noam Tselentis with the exception of "Black Mass", recorded at Devasoundz, Athens and mixed in Sweden, "Mrs Victoria" recorded in Cyprus and mixed in Italy, "Lucifer's Hammer" which was recorded in Australia and Athens (additional keyboards) and mixed in Greece, "Winds Of Thor" (vocals recorded in Italy) and "My Name is Man" which was recorded in Germany and mixed in Athens.

"Sons Of A Dream - A Tribute To The Majesty Of Warlord" is abailable November 1st on iTunes/Amazon MP3 and all major e-tailers worldwide. A special, CD specific mastered edition will appear in early 2014 again by Metal Breed Records USA.

Chris Papadakis