Striking an improbable victory for "old-school" heavy metal over the armies of dull power metal, the Ring's debut album, Tales From Midgard, ignores most contemporary 21st century sources to convincingly hark back to '80s metal stalwarts like Iron Maiden, Dio and even (at their very best)... [+] Expand

Striking an improbable victory for "old-school" heavy metal over the armies of dull power metal, the Ring's debut album, Tales From Midgard, ignores most contemporary 21st century sources to convincingly hark back to '80s metal stalwarts like Iron Maiden, Dio and even (at their very best) Manowar. Not just a matter of musical attributes, either, the band reinforces their decidedly "retro attitude" with deadly serious forays into the works of J.R.R. Tolkien for the lyrical inspiration for this, the first of a -- you guessed it -- musical trilogy. Understandably, such a grandiloquent enterprise may seem rather disproportionate for a spare power trio to pull off. Yet the Ring is no ordinary trio, but rather a very resourceful studio beast consisting of multi-talented Scandinavian scene veterans (linked to bands such as Talisman, Jekyll & Hyde and Great King Rat) capable of using any and all available technology to increment and amplify their numbers tenfold; magically rendering the smallest recording studio into a CGI-generated battlefield, if it pleases them. And it's indeed upon this broad canvas that the Ring proceeds to piece together all of the major elements of Tolkien's The Fellowship of the Ring with a string of outstanding metal anthems. Arresting opener "In the Beginning" offers the first shining example: clashing major and minor chords to great effect and laying a sturdy bedrock made of dominating riffs, dense harmonies and soaring melodies, to be further plundered by ensuing triumphs like the charging "Gathering Darkness," the surprisingly hooky "Into the Wild," the utterly spellbinding, nine-minute epic "Halls of Doom," the impressively threatening "The Chase," and the climactic finale of "Last Battle." Even when they fail to gain such lofty heights, additional offerings like "Voices of the Fallen Kings," "Unite or Fall," and the somewhat drifting "Signs by the Silver Stream" are never anything less than solid, and always contribute to a nearly seamless album with no visible Achilles' heel. Instead, each repeated listen of Tales From Midgard improves its qualifications as one of 2004's very best pure heavy metal albums, and an absolute feast for fans who love the classics. ~ Ed Rivadavia, All Music Guide [-] Collapse

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