HammerFall – Masterpieces

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Nuclear Blast
Produced by HammerFall

Masterpieces is basically a chronological collection of every cover song HammerFall have recorded to date and is available both along with their new retrospective DVD Rebels With A Cause, and on its own.

For the sake of completeness it was perhaps necessary to include the likes of Pretty Maids‘ Back To Back, Chastain’s Angel of Mercy and Warlord’s Child of The Damned, lifted directly from the Legacy of Kings, Crimson Thunder and Glory To The Brave albums respectively, but ultimately these tracks are unnecessary as they were just regular album tracks, not bonus tracks. The rest were either bonus tracks on albums in certain territories, b-sides on EPs and singles, or are brand new recordings for this CD. Some have also been contributed to tribute albums.

Of the previously released, but rare, tracks Picture’s Eternal Dark comes from the Heeding The Call EP, Twisted Sister’s We’re Gonna Make It from the Hearts On Fire single, a very strange version of Judas Priest’s Breaking The Law from the Always Will Be EP sees Joacim sound nothing like he normally does, Heavy Load’s Run With The Devil and Accept’s Head Over Heels (actually featuring an appearance by Accept front-man Udo Dirkschneide) both come from the Renegade EP, and Helloween’s I Want Out (with original guitarist Kai Hansen) was subject of its own exclusive single, with Rainbow’s Man On The Silver Mountain as a b-side.

Three more come from the Crimson Thunder album, which carried different bonus tracks in three territories, all cover versions by famous bands from those places; Yngwie Malmsteen’s Rising Force in Europe, Loudness‘ Crazy Night in Japan and KISS‘ Detroit Rock City in the US.

All of these were hard rock or heavy metal songs to start with, so HammerFall’s interpretations aren’t particularly adventurous, they just make them sound like HammerFall. For collectors, who probably bought all the required EPs and special editions of albums (with the possible exceptions of some of the imports) the most interesting songs here are the four new recordings which close the disc. The first, När Vindarna Viskar Mitt Namn (also featured on the new DVD), was original sung by Roger Pontare as Sweden’s Eurovision Song Contest entry in 2000. Turning a pop song into a metal song is always an interesting exercise and HammerFall have done a good job here.

The next two are closer to the originals in Riot’s Flight of The Warrior and Skid Row’s Youth Gone Wild, the latter being the better. And finally the instrumental guitar work-out by Europe, Aphasia, closes the album and sticks reasonably close to the original, heavying it up slightly.

For fans who haven’t collected all of the EPs/singles this is complete and indispensable, excepting the three regular album songs. For those who have, very few fans are likely to have, for example, bought all three versions of Crimson Thunder so there should be at least two more cover versions from those that are new here, plus the four exclusive ones. It is however disappointing that many fans collections could still remain incomplete as Stormwitch’s Ravenlord is only included on the South American version of this CD, meaning the only place the rest of the World can find it is the Glory To The Brave single.

“ complete and indispensable ”

Tracklist: Tracklist: Child of The Damned / Eternal Dark / Back To Back / I Want Out / Man On The Silver Mountain / Head Over Heels / Run With The Devil / We’re Gonna Make It / Breaking The Law / Angel of Mercy / Rising Force / Detroit Rock City / Crazy Nights / När Vindarna Viskar Mitt Namn / Flight of The Warrior / Youth Gone Wild / Aphasia
South America Bonus Track: Ravenlord

Written by Andy Lye
More: Compilation Albums, Power Metal, HammerFall