{"id":23509,"date":"2015-01-23T00:00:52","date_gmt":"2015-01-23T00:00:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/?p=23509"},"modified":"2015-02-03T19:35:00","modified_gmt":"2015-02-03T19:35:00","slug":"album-review-scanner-the-judgement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/album-review-scanner-the-judgement\/","title":{"rendered":"SCANNER – The Judgement (2015) | Album \/ EP Reviews @ Metal Forces Magazine"},"content":{"rendered":"

SCANNER
The Judgement<\/strong><\/span>
\n\"\"
\nMassacre (2015)<\/span>
Rating: 9\/10<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\n\n\n
<\/td>\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n
\n
<\/span><\/div>\n<\/td>\n
\n
<\/span><\/div>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n

Much of my teenage years \u2013 which took place in the 1980s \u2013 were spent listening to German heavy metal. I was a sucker for the Teutonic devastation conjured up via the likes of thrash metal gods Kreator, Sodom and Destruction<\/a>.<\/p>\n

However, festering below this genre of intensity was an equally clinical bunch of bands offering up steely precision, as the likes of Helloween, Sinner, Rage, Mania and Grave Digger successfully mixed traditional heavy metal with thrash and power metal nuances. Another clan of German headbangers which could be thrown into this mix were Scanner.<\/p>\n

Having formed as Lions Breed in 1982 \u2013 releasing their debut album Damn The Night<\/em> in 1985 \u2013 they became Scanner in 1986 before delivering the excellent Hypertrace<\/em> two years later. This was followed by 1989\u2019s Terminal Death<\/em>, but sadly album releases have been rather sporadic throughout the band\u2019s career due to several upheavals in personnel. Scanner survived the 90s with two solid albums \u2013 Mental Reservation<\/em> (1995) and Ball Of The Damned<\/em> (1996) \u2013 but following 2002\u2019s Scantropolis <\/em>it\u2019s taken 13 years for this latest album to appear.<\/p>\n

The Judgement<\/em> is an 11-track outing that reminds me as to why I was such a Scanner fan back in the 1980s; this is very much typical 80s German metal, and there\u2019s nothing wrong with that whatsoever. With countless new bands trying to replicate this kind of anthemic, blazing brand of galloping metal, it\u2019s down to the likes of Scanner to show just how it\u2019s really executed. <\/p>\n

After a short intro, it\u2019s a case of being thrown straight into the metallic frenzy with the sizzling \u2018F.T.B.\u2019, and it feels like we\u2019re back in 1988. Hurtling drums from Franz Eichberger (since replaced by the returning Patrick Klose) and that double-edged sword attack of guitarists Axel \u201cA.J.\u201d Julius (the only surviving founding member) and Andreas Zeidler, provide that sort of perfectly executed gallop which was so typical of the 80s and yet still sounds as fresh today as it ever was.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a certain charm with these sort of bands, probably because we know exactly what we\u2019re getting and we know that we\u2019re going to love it. Although the likes of Rage injected heaps of experimentation and progression into their metallic charge, Scanner just goes for the throat with a set of tracks that\u2019ll have you pounding your chest until your ribs splinter through the skin.<\/p>\n

\u2018F.T.B.\u2019 is a straight down the line power thrasher, and for me Greek-born vocalist Efthimios Ioannidis (who joined the band in 2003) is as potent, if not more so than previous howlers; Michael \u201cM.A.J.O.R.\u201d Knoblich (1986-88) and S.L. Coe (1989-91), who marched Scanner through the 80s and early 90s. Ioannidis has a sort of no frills, yet commanding vocal presence; typically 80s by design, his clear yet authoritative croon was made for lyrics such as \u201cRun, fight… fight for your right… fuck the bastards, leave them behind\u201d<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The Judgement<\/em> begins in typically studded, masculine fashion and doesn\u2019t alter its path whatsoever as \u2018Nevermore\u2019 simmers with the sound of a storm and whispered narrative, only to be taken over by an electrical charge of killer guitar melody and thundering drum. Again, it\u2019s that successful marrying of gleaming, cutting thrash metal and head-slamming power metal.<\/p>\n

\u2018Warlord\u2019 is wondrously lethal in its hammering; up there with the likes of Destruction and Sodom with its initial barrage of guitar, bass and drum concoction, and vocally Efthimios puts in his most powerful performance. Forget the latest offering from Sanctuary (2014\u2019s The Year The Sun Died<\/em>); this is how modern metal should be churned out \u2013 the vocals soaring like a banshee above the iron curtain of percussion. These are the sort of songs by which us teenagers lived our life by, such is the precise prowess as the quintet excels itself by way of conjuring up hellish leads, crunching riffs and an overall feel that is at once nostalgic and yet progressive.<\/p>\n

\u2018Eutopia\u2019 takes the potency and mysticism of Dio and cranks it up a notch; the track is strewn with smouldering leads which worm their way through that punishing chug. The almost soulful melodies provided by the backing choir add to the steely atmosphere as the cut builds to a destructive chorus of wailing vocals and sturdy drum battering.<\/p>\n

The title track begins with a clanking bell chime and yet musically evolves into one of the album\u2019s most melodic entities with a healthy ingredient of thrash and power metal sprigs. Even so, for me, in spite of its duelling solo, \u2018The Judgement\u2019 is probably one of the album\u2019s weakest moments. However, with the epic \u2018Battle Of Poseidon\u2019 and mid-tempo moodiness of \u2018Pirates\u2019 still to come, any hint of a flaw is soon extinguished as the band rattles off further anthemic gems. The album climaxes with the brilliant strains of \u2018The Legionary\u2019, where the vocals take on several different appearances as they cavort effortlessly with the sort of enigmatic power metal passages we\u2019ve become accustomed to over the years with such German rockers. <\/p>\n

Scanner is the sort of leviathan that through its struggles has continually churned out high quality metal. Each track on this new platter unfolds through a series of pulverising shifts, with each instrument engaging with one another as if in some epic duel and then spinning off on its own immaculate journey. How such a band has never garnered the attention it so richly deserves is probably down to its own intermittent activity, but when it comes to the crunch \u2013 and believe me this is<\/em> crunch time for Scanner \u2013 The Judgement<\/em> is right up there with those early classics which made German metal seen so dominant.<\/p>\n

Neil Arnold<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

SCANNERThe Judgement Massacre (2015)Rating: 9\/10 Much of my teenage years \u2013 which took place in the 1980s \u2013 were spent listening to German heavy metal. I was a sucker for the Teutonic devastation conjured up via the likes of thrash metal gods Kreator, Sodom and Destruction. However, festering below this genre of intensity was an […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24,1625],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23509","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-album-ep-reviews","category-scanner"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23509","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23509"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23509\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23513,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23509\/revisions\/23513"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23509"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23509"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23509"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}