I’m a trad metal fan. It is, hands-down, my favorite metal genre. As much as I try to shake things up with a bit of prog or power metal, my well-worn copy of Mercyful Fate‘s Don’t Break the Oath never strays too far out of my reach. So, with a metal palette like mine, I […]

My relationship with Widow has been up and down. I really liked my introduction to them, On Fire, when they were a female-fronted, horror-themed outfit. Their last outing, Nightlife, just didn’t do anything for me. So I went into Life’s Blood not really knowing what to expect, and that’s probably why it took me so […]

On their full-length debut Curse of the Artizan, Florida-based Artizan walk a line between the classic sounds of Judas Priest and Iron Maiden and a lighter weight brand of power metal, detouring just occasionally for some prog. The results are mixed. When it’s good, it’s really good, but too often, it doesn’t quite work. Artizan’s […]