Sacrifice

For years, metal revivalists have been working day and night to try replicating just what it is that makes classic metal so special, toiling to create a kind of metal pastiche that pays homage to the heavy-hitters of the past, but without really coming close. Fortunately, once in a while one of those sleeping giants of heavy metal's past stirs to deliver upon the world a reminder of what things were like when the gods of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal strode the earth, the most recent addition to that pantheon being Saxon's 20th album, Sacrifice. The album finds Saxon returning to do what they do best, rocking hard with ten tracks of straight-ahead, no-frills, old-school metal. While there are plenty of bands out there trying to capture this kind of sound, they often fall into the trap of overdoing it, turning their albums into hyper-excessive parodies, but for practiced hands like Saxon who know well enough to let the volume do the talking, this isn't a problem. Much like Overkill have been doing with albums like Ironbound and The Electric Age, this album feels more like a reestablishment than a reinvention, with Saxon showing that while they might not have any new tricks up their sleeves after over 40 years of rocking, the trick they do have is a pretty impressive one, making Sacrifice an album that will not only satisfy longtime metal fans, but might draw younger listeners away from the revivers and back to the survivors. ~ Gregory Heaney