Cover Art: I’ll be honest here, I only decided to check this album out because I thought the cover looked pretty cool and partially due to the band/album name; Skelator – Time of the Sword Rulers. Common, TIME OF THE SWORD RULERS, that just screams epic power metal. So we got some some Dracula Castlevania looking Alucard dark knight guy with a sword looking down on some shit, metal as fuck yo. I’d like to think this this was done using traditional mediums but not really sure. The name of the band itself is pretty themed medieval Gothic like, Skelator man, can’t say no to that.
Album Review: When the band is called Skelator, I didn’t really think they were talking about THE SKELATOR of He-Man but seriously, from what I heard in the intro sequence, that it literally what they are talking about, the villain Skelator from He-Man. References aside, this band plays power speed metal which is obviously fantasy themed with songs mentioning orcs, gondor, odin, swords, magic and the like which is fine. The style and lyrical inspiration are very similar to the heavy metal speed band 3 Inches of Blood, with very high pitched vocals, lighting fast riffs and equally rapid drum work. However, this particular album seems very unrefined, lacking polish and production finish, it almost sounds like they are playing in a garage or small venue, which maybe is what they are actually aiming for/are actually doing for this album but for me it’s not really doing it and it just sounds sloppy. I’m not really a big fan of these kinds of live-performance recordings which what this may actually be but even then I can’t really think of a single song that I can remember, it just all blends into the same high speed riffs with no real direction or melody for each song and with that in mind, all the songs sound the same to me.
Maybe I’ll take a look at some of their newer work, but for me, this album is pretty mediocre and forgettable.
Score: 5