Black Sabre - High Speed Warrior

 

This year I got thrust Black Sabre's demo CDr titled "High Speed Warrior" into my hands at MDF by Carmine - I think - after he saw my Manilla Road backpatch. "Hey you must like traditional metal! Here's my demo!" Ahhh, the glorious freebies of metal festivals. Honestly these free gifts at MDF have been decent for me. Warmaster handed me their demo four years ago and this year they put out the awesome Pyramids of the Necropolis. I've gotten stuff from Dimentainon and Sectioned too plus a ton of unmemorable stuff. Black Sabre's sound could be compared to Axe Battler however less refined. Elements of Iron Maiden and Cirith Ungol are prevalent. The band cites Exciter too but I don't here the similarity really. Black Sabre are nowhere near as fast or aggressive. The demo came in a simple folded printout holder featuring black and white artwork, some band pictures and, in my case, what looks like a beer stain. Perfect!

The whole thing lasts eight minutes. Three tracks are all just at the three minute mark. Opening track "Midnight Rebel" is a quick track with fast shouted vocal bursts and some high pitched wails courtesy of Seax vocalist Carmine Blade. Not bad, not particularly excellent either. The weakest of the three tracks. The highlight of the track is guitarist Baron and some of his leads. Second track, "High Speed Warrior," is my favorite track. At times Carmine's vocals rekindle fond memories of Cirith Ungol's Tim Baker and his iconic vocals on Frost and Fire. Final track, "Iron Heroes," has a memorable intro riff and is well written but the riffs afterwards don't seem to catch my attention. The demo's overall vibe is positive though. Three guys that really like metal and just want to occupy their time with writing some music. You can't fault them really for that and I've heard plenty of stuff that starts with the same attitude become much more. I'll keep my ears on these guys to see what they do next. It may turn out to be really excellent. You never know.