I had the somewhat dubious pleasure early last year to discover the comeback release of Swedish traditional metal exponents Overdrive, a five track EP featuring just one new song and re-workings of four older tracks celebrating the bands return from the wilderness and first released work since about 1984.

Solid musically but somewhat lacking in originality, the EP clearly laid strong foundations though as here, Overdrive have produced a fine album of no-nonsense, superbly produced and played metal that will evoke memories of the early 80s scene and delight any fan of well played heavy rock.

Recommended if you like Judas Priest, Saxon etc "Let The Metal Do The Talking" is a hugely enjoyable, if slightly clichéd, statement of intent and the album just hammers home riff after riff of solid metal the way its supposed to be delivered.

The title track and "Bring Me To Submission" stand out early on, "Deceived" witnesses an impressive move into something like Queensryche territory, and a well placed instrumental, "Den Of Iniquity", resurrects a fine metal tradition that you don't get too often these days. A final track named "Reincarnation" both celebrates this somewhat unlikely successful comeback and also perhaps offers the best chance of notable attention featuring as it does the vocal talents of Chris Catena. That's not to say there's any issues with 'regular' lead singer Per Karlsson though, who as the only non-original member in this reunion possibly had the hardest job to perform - and perform he does superbly.

So much stronger than the EP its a genuine pleasure to witness the leaps Overdrive have made between that and this release. An excellent album.

****

Review by Bill Leslie