ZANDELLE - Shadows Of The Past

13 songs
66:40 minutes
***** **
Pure Steel

Bandpage

Two years after their forth longplayer Flames Of Rage, American power metal band Zandelle are back with Shadows Of The Past. The album name is already a hint that this is not a regular album. Instead the band has rerecorded four songs of their debut EP Zandelle from 1996 and six songs from their debut album Shadows Of Reality, both of which are hard to find nowadays. Furthermore they have added a previously unreleased track from the sessions of Vengeance Rising (2006), the brand new Scream My Name which has really great guitar riffs but utterly goofy lyrics and a cover version of Whitesnake’s Bad Boys, which may be an untypical choice but works rather well in this newly powered up rendition.

In later years Zandelle combined the muscular American brand power metal with the more symphonic European styled metal, but in their early years they were still deeply rooted in typical US metal. I am not familiar with the original versions of these ten songs, but the new ones definitely have undeniable charm. Ok, so the ballad Angel which sounds like Virgin Steele at their cheesiest can at the very most only achieve to guilty pleasure status, but the remaining material offers a good mix of high pitched vocals, ferocious drumming and a pace which most of the time could be described as mid-tempo but which is also not afraid to occasionally speed things up.

It’s been two years since Zandelle’s last regular album, and Shadows Of The Past has been recorded by only three members of the band. Since then two guitarists have been added to the line-up, and I am sure that the New Yorkers are right now busily working on new songs. Until then you can check out this charming compilation that gives you a revamped look at the early years of this as yet rather overlooked American power metal band. The CD comes with an additional disc containing the original versions of the ten early songs. Alas, my promo package didn’t contain those so I am unable to compare the new recordings to the old ones.