Striker: Ultrapower (2024, Record Breaking Records)

Born in 2007 in Edmonton, Alberta (Canada), the veterans of the metal scene Striker have always shied away from labels and have dedicated themselves to simply doing what fascinates them most. Like other bands in the area such as Cauldron or Skull Fist, the quintet has always opted for heavy metal as the basis of their compositions but making use of all the musical tools at their disposal to stand out from the rest of the projects of the same genre in order to do so of not joining the bandwagon of the somewhat hated scene of the so-called New Wave of Traditional Heavy Metal.

His first two albums Eyes In The Night (2010, Iron Kodex Records) and Armed To The Teeth (2012, Napalm Records) cemented a solid career with quality heavy metal that approached the roots of the genre without being able to stand out but that fulfilled well within an established genre without pushing the boundaries. With the arrival of City Of Gold (2014, Napalm Records) they broke certain barriers, also improving the quality of their compositions that, thanks to the work of Fredrik Nordström and Henrik Udd as producers and mixers, gave their third full-length album enough maturity to move away of the rest of the albums from that vintage and stand on its own.

What perhaps managed to break the limits of what Striker had previously established was the release of Play To Win (2018, Record Breaking Records), an album that would change certain aspects of his music and that some would venture to classify as a sell-out. In my humble opinion I must say that the change that Striker brought to his compositions on Play To Win was a total success that broke certain molds and made his songs have a more important role and stood out above the rest of the albums in the heavy metal scene, beyond dividing the opinion of the purest followers and thus managing to attract a new batch of young metalheads who would embrace the praiseworthy work of its members with this new album.

What would be the next chapter in Striker‘s story after Play To Win? In 2020 they released the live album Alive In The Studio independently, raising certain suspicions of a breakup in 2021 when the band published a post on their social networks with the phrase “RIP Striker 2007-2021” that finally became a strategy of marketing that resulted in an effort to prepare fans for their new music before releasing the single Deathwish, inspired by 1980s AOR with a modern twist.

What was to come after Deathwish was the clearest path for Striker, a logical move that has undoubtedly obtained a more than gratifying result with the release of Ultrapower, an album that lives up to its title in which everything is perfectly balanced and which also expands the heavy metal universe to which the quintet had accustomed us. Here we can find true heavy metal anthems on speed like the opener Circle Of Evil or the somewhat more forceful Blood Magic in which their guitarists John Simon Fallon and Timothy Brown achieve a much more solid sound than on their previous albums.

I can’t object at all about Dan Cleary‘s voice, probably one of my favorites within the genre that comes out in absolutely every song here. Where I liked it the most is precisely in Give It All, a song that I have been hooked on since it was released and that has become one of my favorites not only from the album but from the band. The most curious thing about the album is the versatility with which they manage to combine the eighties sound that stands out precisely in Give It All with the most aggressive heavy metal and at the same time provide us with authentic gems like THUNDERDOME or BEST Of The BEST Of The BEST in which we can see the perfect cohesion of their genres incorporating elements from a wide range of genres and resulting in songs closer to AOR such as Live To Fight Another Day or the powerful and moving City Calling.

The best of all is that they have kept the ace up their sleeve until the end of the album to finish delighting us with a catchy Brawl At The Pub where drummer Jonathan Webster and bassist Pete Klassen stand out above the rest, something like already It happened in Give It All. Few albums can have an annihilating song like Brawl At The Pub to put an end to a forty-minute album where there is absolutely nothing left over, making history like few bands have managed to achieve lately and at the same time expanding their sound even further, embracing all kinds of influences to leave us all with our mouths open.