Released by: Metalville
Genre: Heavy metal
Release date: 24 February 2017

Line up:

Thobbe Englund – Guitar and Vocals
Elon Andersson – Keyboards
Roland Westborn – Bass
Johan Grandin – Drums

Tracklist:

Sold My Soul
Annihilation
I Am
The Glow
It Burns
Steel & Thunder
The Flame
Break the Chains
Wounded Knee
Farewell
The Ashes

Since Leaving Sabaton last year Thobbe Englund has been a busy boy. The Scandinavian Guitarist, who loves Yngwie Malmsteen, recorded the majority of his Sold My Soul in his own studio in Falun, Sweden. With this album, Thobbe Englund wants to go back to the roots of Heavy Metal, and by jove has he done it well.

The album opens with the riff heavy title track if you didn’t know this was a new album you would swear you had heard this somewhere before, a long time ago. Sold My Soul is swiftly followed by Annihilation, a drum beat rapid firing tune, which at just over 3 mins is longer than the opening track, but bounces by before you know it. I Am is another stunner, so far on this album, I’ve heard likenesses to Motorhead, Judas Priest, Metallica and Iron Maiden, and that is just in the first three songs. I’m intrigued to see where the remaining eight songs take me.

The Glow is next and is this Black Sabbath I hear? How many more inspirations can one fit in one album? This is beginning to turn into a game of spot the beginnings of Heavy Metal, although I’m pretty sure that is what Thobbe Englund is aiming for.

Steel and Thunder is a perfect rock and roll driving song, Tragen Winner looks like it has snuck on to the album last minute, as it isn’t included on the press release, but my does it sound good. You would be forgiven for thinking that The Flame is a drawn out Prog number, as that is what is sounds like as you listen to the first two and a half minutes, and then you realize that’s where it ends, not a vocal in earshot, just pure guitar.

Back to a bit of old school Iron Maiden for Break The Chains, before embarking on the epic of the album, at 4:56 Wounded Knee is a heavy metal song, mixed with a pinch of native American, and a generous dash of Kiss’s I Was made For Loving You, mixed with a bit more Iron Maiden and a splash of Black Sabbath. What a concoction, but amazingly it works, and is my favorite song on the album, which is a tough choice to make.

The last two songs on the album, Farewell, and The Ashes finish it off nicely. With The Ashes finishing what The Glow started.

There is nothing groundbreaking on this album, but in honor to a certain Metal magazine that has just been rescued from the ashes, If I was to hand somebody a CD that covers what Heavy Metal is, Sold My Soul, would be a serious new contender on the block. Thobbe Englund set out to go back to the roots of heavy metal with this album, and mission complete. My first favorite album of the new year.

Reviewed by Kalli Isborne