German power metal quintet Primal Fear spent years building up a smallish but devoted audience entirely based on their ability to sound like late-'80s Judas Priest.
Vocalist Ralf Scheepers can deliver a pitch-perfect Rob Halford imitation, and the band (bassist Matt Sinner, drummer Randy Black, and whoever's playing guitar) deliver the riffs in spades.
And for much of this album ("Sign of Fear," "Blood On Your Hands," the title track), they do what's expected of them, with maybe a little more melody than before.
But there are quite a few stylistic left turns that make New Religion a controversial album among Primal Fear fans.
First and foremost, there's "Every Time It Rains," a duet with Epica vocalist Simone Simons on which guitars are replaced by synth strings, and Scheepers actually sounds more like Axl Rose than Rob Halford.
"Face the Emptiness" features such a heavy dose of keyboard sweetening, it could appear on the soundtrack to a Japanese animated cartoon.
It's far from a total washout; Primal Fear still hold power metal close to their hearts, and there are plenty of anthemic, fist-pumping tracks here.
But this shouldn't be anyone's introduction to the band.
| Title/Composers | Performer | Listen | Time | Size | Size | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Sign of FearStefan Leibing, Tom Naumann, Ralf Scheepers, Mat Sinner | Primal Fear | Play | 04:46 | 10 MB | 35 MB |
| 2 | Face the EmptinessStefan Leibing, Tom Naumann, Ralf Scheepers, Mat Sinner | Primal Fear | Play | 04:35 | 10 MB | 35 MB |
| 3 | Everytime It RainsSascha Dupont, Brian Steckler | Primal Fear | Play | 03:52 | 8 MB | 28 MB |
| 4 | New ReligionJohan Fransson, Mat Sinner | Primal Fear | Play | 04:03 | 9 MB | 0 MB |
| 5 | Reprise | Primal Fear | Play | 01:15 | 2 MB | 9 MB |
| 6 | Blood on Your HandsStefan Leibing, Tom Naumann, Ralf Scheepers, Mat Sinner | Primal Fear | Play | 04:01 | 9 MB | 30 MB |
| 7 | The Curse of SharonStefan Leibing, Tom Naumann, Ralf Scheepers, Mat Sinner | Primal Fear | Play | 04:39 | 10 MB | 34 MB |
| 8 | Too Much TimeStefan Leibing, Tom Naumann, Ralf Scheepers, Mat Sinner | Primal Fear | Play | 05:13 | 11 MB | 39 MB |
| 9 | PsychoStefan Leibing, Tom Naumann, Ralf Scheepers, Mat Sinner | Primal Fear | Play | 03:53 | 8 MB | 28 MB |
| 10 | World on FireStefan Leibing, Tom Naumann, Ralf Scheepers, Mat Sinner | Primal Fear | Play | 03:52 | 8 MB | 29 MB |
| 11 | The Man (That I Don't Know)Stefan Leibing, Tom Naumann, Ralf Scheepers, Mat Sinner | Primal Fear | Play | 06:10 | 14 MB | 42 MB |
| 12 | Fighting The Darkness | Primal Fear | Play | 03:36 | 8 MB | 27 MB |
| 13 | The Darkness | Primal Fear | Play | 03:51 | 8 MB | 27 MB |
| 53 mins | 123 MB | |||||
| 49 mins | 366 MB | |||||
| Artist | Job | |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Charly Bauerfeind | Engineer, Producer |
| 2 | Randy Black | Drums |
| 3 | Sascha Dupont | Composer |
| 4 | Johan Fransson | Composer |
| 5 | Magnus Karlsson | Guest Artist, Guitar |
| 6 | Stefan Leibing | Composer |
| 7 | Tobias Lundgren | Guest Artist, Vocals (Background) |
| 8 | Tom Naumann | Composer |
| 9 | Ronald Prent | Mixing |
| 10 | Primal Fear | Primary Artist |
| 11 | Ralf Scheepers | Composer, Engineer, Vocals |
| 12 | Simone Simons | Guest Artist, Vocals |
| 13 | Mat Sinner | Bass, Composer, Cover Art Concept, Engineer, Orchestration, Producer, Vocals |
| 14 | Brian Steckler | Composer |
| 15 | Matz Ulmer | Engineer, Guest Artist, Keyboards, Orchestration |
| Quality | Format | Encoding | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Standard | MP3 | 320kps 44.1kHz | MP3 is an audio coding format which uses a form of lossy data compression. The highest bitrate of this format is 320kbps (kbit/s). MP3 Digital audio takes less amount of space (up to 90% reduction in size) and the quality is not as good as the original one. |