 
Iced Earth are back with their eleventh studio
album and like true Iced Earth style there has
been a bit of a line up change since their tenth
studio album ‘Dystopia’ with Jon Dette
taking over on drums and Luke Appleton taking
over on bass and once again Jon Schaffer and his
ever changing bunch of musicians have pulled off
another solid album release as ‘Plagues
Of Babylon’ is full of memorable moments
with a few of the songs easily going to find their
way as regulars at future live shows.
The album kicks off with the fantastic single
and album title track ‘Plagues Of Babylon’,
the song is truly epic running way into the 7minute
mark and opens with some truly amazing guitar
work from Jon Schaffer and Troy Steele as they
seriously lay down some loud powerful riffs, vocally
Stu Block is on top form with his vocals sounding
bigger, stronger and with a more catchy vibe than
they did on the previous album ‘Dystopia’,
whilst the rest of the band get involved with
epic backing vocals creating such an atmospheric
feeling.
‘Democide’ is a pretty heavy offering
opening up with some solid drum beats before the
guitars come in at 100miles per hour and the band
solidly jam for a couple of minutes laying down
some seriously technical and heavy sounding instrumental
work whilst Stu Block lays down his vocals in
a big hard hitting and confidence way as he vocally
let’s off as much energy as the rest of
the band do instrumentally.
‘The Culling’ is easily the most melodic
song on the album but it also happens to be the
stand out track on the album as when the song
hit’s its peak everything becomes so enjoyable
on your ears as Stu Block sings “We will
tear the weak from the strong to enslave the masses,
our storm has come, see the times are ending until
the culling is over” in a such a beautiful
and melodic way showing off his massive vocal
range whilst also showing that this time around
he has clearly had more input in the album.
‘Among The Living Dead’ features Hansi
Kursch from Blind Guardian on vocals and the song
picks up the pace from the previous song as the
band go all out laying down meaty riffs and generally
filling the airwaves with fast paced heavy instrumental
work which in places sounds like early Metallica
and vocally sounds like Tenacious D and you will
know exactly what I mean as the song reaches the
2minute 30second mark.
I personally think Plagues OF Babylon is one of
the strongest albums Iced Earth have created in
years and the majority of the album is a fantastic
listen with only the last couple of tracks letting
the album down as Iced Earth cover the classic
song ‘Highwayman’ which sounds pretty
damn cheesy and then finish the album with a short
25 second spoken word outro which really is a
waste of 25 seconds.
Hardcore fans of Iced Earth are going to love
Plagues Of Babylon and anyone who gets to see
Iced Earth on the live circuit over the next year
or so are going to be in for a treat when Iced
Earth fill their set with songs from this really
impressive metal album.
4/5
Review by Trigger
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