Lethal Saint – Lethal Saint (2010)

In our playlist we find ourselves today with Lethal Saint’s self-title debut album. After doing some research we find out that the band hails from Cyprus and they formed back in 2006. As you would imagine from the cover of this album, the band is plays old-school Heavy Metal, a style that has been gaining a second round at the spotlight and many bands are jumping in to capitalize on this movement.

“Lethal Saint” features 12 songs and over 70 minutes of music, a feat that seems very impressive for a band’s first release. However, the overall impression is that this release is a hit and miss festival, there are good songs, and then some very bad ones. The common factor that brings this band’s debut release to a low score of 70 points is the off-key vocalist.

Trying to play traditional Heavy Metal is a daunting task that should not be taken lightly by bands, since you need the right attitude, feeling, and abilities to pull it off. Lethal Saint has only a few percentages in each department, making the release feel rehashed and forced at some moment.

However, not all is bad, the album has been made to sound like those old recordings from back on the day and this gives some points to the overall sound of the band. The music is quite decent, featuring simple guitar hooks and brief but powerful solos. The vocalist is decent when he stays on key, but at other times he sounds very bad (like in “Chains Of The Devil”), and the vocal FX’s that are used here and there greatly hurt him instead of help him.

The album is well structured, having the traditional ‘balls to the wall’ tracks that make people jump and break shit, it also has slower tunes and a power ballad in “Visions Of The Night”. Here is where this release starts to feel more like a product than an actual heartfelt album, you can suspect that the band tried to follow the classical formula into making a Heavy Metal album. This would have worked back in the day, but now people can see through this stuff and will get a band slammed by some people.

In general, “Lethal Saint” is a release that shows potential and showcases good formulaic Heavy Metal music. If you could take out the vocals for the most part of this album, this release would have gotten a score of 80-85 points. Only if you are looking for the old-school vibe in your Heavy Metal albums (and don’t mind bad vocals) you should get this release.

Release: February 9th, 2010

Country: Cyprus