Ancient Prophecy is band out of Germany formed in 1996 and have had released two demo’s, “Days of Doom” (1998), and “New Chapter” (2010, update 2011) in the past. The new album “Pounded by Our Sins” released in 2015 shows the band playing an interesting blend of traditional heavy metal and power metal with progressive and death elements. In essence Ancient Prophecy is a hybrid metal band.
They take their music and play it with high quality. Their songs are often filled with melodic solo’s, and catchy riffs which paints the landscape for Jaqueline Kunz (main, back-vocals) and her amazing clean vocals balanced by growling and screaming male vocals. In all I find the music is atmospheric and hard hitting and their songs are filled about their personal relationship with God and the life of a believer. It has quiet an outreach and ministry value as an album.
You can hear from the lyrics throughout that Ancient Prophecy make music to honour God. There is no mistaking in who their faith is in, the one true God. There is Jesus all over the lyrics, and those lyrics are bold testimonials of their faith in Jesus Christ. “Our lyrics talk about life with Jesus Christ and the experiences of those who trust in Him. God is sovereign and cannot be influenced; He stands by His word (the Bible), even if everyone were to renounce Him and the world were to end.” – Ancient Prophecy
There are so many branches of metal these days, and so many modern metal bands are in fact a hybrid or a culmination of two or more of these branches. In the case of Ancient Prophecy I find their music is best described as a blend of power metal and traditional metal with progressive elements. Though I don’t know if it’s because of the style of Jaqueline Kunz’s vocals, but there is a hint of symphonic that comes out of the music for me too (Band like HB). So yes not an easy band to package, which ultimately makes it an interesting album to review.
There is certainly an epic feel to the largeness of their music with anthemic like qualities. They open the album strongly with the ringing out, “Metal Is Still Alive”, a proper metal anthem song filled with a large chorus, catchy riffage and power vocal performance by Jaqueline elevated by the balance of the growl filled male vocals just in the right places. The album continues to follow that pattern throughout, and what you as the listener get are powerfully written songs that follow a similar strength and pace from the start to the end.
There are few albums in any genre of music where one can see the progression of quality and delivery just get better and better as the songs land on one another. “Pounded by Our Sins” succeeds in this department with flying colours, and by the time “Pounded” hits your ears you are submersed in a world of powerful vocal delivery, crazy catchy guitar riffs, and excellent pace and momentum. This a high class release worthy to sit in any meatheads collection as a prime example of fantastic quality fuelled metal. For me the words I paint of “Pounded by Our Sins” cannot match the listening pleasure I had from actually listening to it.
Rating: 9.5/10
Written by Donovan de Necker
Tracks:
1 – Metal Is Still Alive
2 – The New Chapter
3 – True Trinity
4 – Pounded
5 – Look Into My Soul
6 – Brightness
7 – The Fall Of Vanity
8 – Still Dying
9 – Eternity
Members:
Jaqueline Kunz – main & back-vocals
Timothy Bostick – bass guitar
Florian Kraus – guitar & back-vocals
Tobias Buß – guitar, main & back-vocals
Lynn André Neißner – drums & management
Record Label: Independent, 2015
Discography:
“Days of Doom” (1998) (Demo)
“New Chapter” (2010, update 2011) (Demo)
“Pounded By Our Sins” (2015)
Weblinks: Facebook / Website / Webshop
Buy the album here:
Holland: First Paradox
Norway: Nordic Mission
Video for: ‘Eternity’