{"id":71331,"date":"2018-08-02T00:01:47","date_gmt":"2018-08-02T00:01:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/?p=71331"},"modified":"2018-08-02T14:42:13","modified_gmt":"2018-08-02T14:42:13","slug":"album-review-udo-steelfactory","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/album-review-udo-steelfactory\/","title":{"rendered":"U.D.O. – Steelfactory (2018) | Album \/ EP Reviews @ Metal Forces Magazine"},"content":{"rendered":"

U.D.O.
Steelfactory<\/strong><\/span>
\n\"\"
\nAFM (2018)<\/span>
Rating: 9\/10<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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Steelfactory<\/em> is heavy metal as I know it and possibly the best record U.D.O. has released to date. I\u2019ll go one step further and posit that it\u2019s possibly the best straight forward metal record of 2018 we\u2019ve seen released yet.<\/p>\n

Sure, I know Judas Priest released Firepower<\/em><\/a> back in March, but what if I told you U.D.O.\u2019s Steelfactory<\/em> record was far better, song for song? Yeah, yeah, yeah, blasphemy, I know, but guess what? It\u2019s true!<\/p>\n

I\u2019m very impressed how well this record turned out considering that Udo Dirkschneider himself has been touring the last few years under the Dirkschneider moniker, performing the greatest hits of his former band Accept. Believe it or not, Udo still has one final leg of this tour he\u2019ll complete later in 2018. So it\u2019s amazing how he found time to write this record, assemble his solo band, rehearse and record Steelfactory<\/em> and get it released. But that\u2019s Udo, he\u2019s a metal machine, it\u2019s in his DNA.<\/p>\n

The pitfall many artists fall into who\u2019ve been around for decades is lack of creativity that leads to generic or formulaic art. That\u2019s definitely not Udo. The older, more mature he gets, the harder he hits back, the more aggressive he goes at metal. And he\u2019s right. After listening to the strength and ferocity of this record it\u2019s time to put Accept to bed and focus on his own music \u2013 this record is that good. But, and I\u2019ll say this one time and one time only, Steelfactory<\/em> is reminiscent to a small degree of early Accept. <\/p>\n

\u2018Rising High\u2019 could easily be on Accept\u2019s 1982 record Restless And Wild<\/em>. But this style of music is really muscle memory when Udo writes and gets behind a mic. It\u2019s automatic and natural to him, whereas if Accept in its current form tried to mimic this style I doubt it would translate well. And let\u2019s not forget U.D.O. the band on this record are on fire. Their chemistry together is intense; these guys are playing with a hunger and spirit for metal I haven\u2019t heard in a long time from too many bands making records today.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s hard to single out the best songs on the record since they\u2019re all good. In fact, every song on this record feels like an anthem in its own right. But \u2018In The Heat Of The Night\u2019, \u2018Raise The Game\u2019, the aforementioned \u2018Rising High\u2019, and \u2018Eraser\u2019 are the tracks thatreally stand out. The guitar attack coupled with Dirkschneider\u2019s trademark voice \u2013 which never ages, by the way \u2013 and the insane, double bass drumming is all on mark and it makes Steelfactory<\/em> a true rager.<\/p>\n

The digipak version of this record contains two bonus songs, \u2018The Devil Is An Angel\u2019 and \u2018Pictures In My Dreams\u2019. But honestly, there\u2019s not a bum track on Steelfactory<\/em> and as the name implies, steel doesn\u2019t lie. If you dig classic 80s metal then this one\u2019s for you. U.D.O., the true kings of metal, still reign supreme.<\/p>\n

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

U.D.O.Steelfactory AFM (2018)Rating: 9\/10 Steelfactory is heavy metal as I know it and possibly the best record U.D.O. has released to date. I\u2019ll go one step further and posit that it\u2019s possibly the best straight forward metal record of 2018 we\u2019ve seen released yet. Sure, I know Judas Priest released Firepower back in March, but […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24,548],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-71331","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-album-ep-reviews","category-u-d-o"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71331","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=71331"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71331\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":71333,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71331\/revisions\/71333"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=71331"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=71331"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=71331"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}