  
I remember heading down to Castle Donington in
2006 for the Download Festival and I happened
to catch Dragonforce take the main stage by storm,
their live show was show big energetic and enjoyable
that it happened to be one of the best performances
of the day for me and as soon as I got back from
the festival I checked out the bands ‘Inhuman
Rampage’ album, an album which was met with
positive reviews across the board and sold by
the bucket load across the world and helped catapult
the band to success.
Now a good 8 years on and Dragonforce are gearing
up to release their sixth studio album ‘Maximum
Overload’ however the excitement which once
surrounded the band has gone and Dragonforce have
a lot to prove with the release of ‘Maximum
Overload’ their second studio album to feature
Marc Hudson on vocals after ZP Theart called it
time on the band back in 2010.
If you checked out the bands last album ‘The
Power Within’ then you will already know
that Marc Hudson is a fantastic vocalist and has
followed on from ZP Theart in such a positive
way but also if you checked out ‘The Power
Within’ you will also know that Dragonforce
created an album full of second rate songs where
a couple of songs were killer and the rest were
filler, luckily with ‘Maximum Overload’
the band have been a bit more creative and also
have gained the help of Trivium’s Matt Heafy
who guests on 3 of the albums 10 tracks.
The album opens with ‘The Game’ a
song which comes crashing towards you with some
extreme speed as the band go all out with their
guitar riffs and drum beats and create some amazing
noise whilst frontman Marc Hudson lays down his
vocals in such style and at such a fast speed
and not to forget the addition on Matt Heafy which
really does add some dynamics to the song and
helps make ‘The Game’ one of the strongest
sounding tracks on the album and also the perfect
opener.
‘Tomorrow’s King’ starts off
sounding like a classic Dragonforce song with
the speed and feel that we have come to expect
from the band but instead of going down a route
where they rock out Dragonforce head down a more
poppy route and move straight into predictable
territories as they lay down the same over run
squealy guitar solos that they have been unleashing
on us for the best part of 15 years now and also
let run with such an infectious yet cheesy chorus.
‘No More’ is the second track on the
album to feature Matt Heafy and from the opening
riffs you can tell that he has had an almighty
influence on the song as it opens with a massive
Trivium feel and the duel vocals from Marc Hudson
and Matt Heafy work well as they kind of battle
off against each other, whilst the rest of the
band lay down their instruments in the same fast
and furious form that we have come to expect however
it is clear to see that Matt Heafy has brought
the metal with him and given Dragonforce a big
rocking make over.
‘Three Hammers’ see’s Dragonforce
go down quite a creative route which is very much
welcomed as over their past couple of albums they
have been majorly criticised for their lack of
creativity and I feel that ‘Three Hammers’
is Dragonforce’s attempt at putting a massive
middle finger up to those critics as they have
gone on and created a track which sounds so different
from anything else on the album and see’s
the band lay off the epic speed and go down a
more serious route.
Tracks like ‘Symphony Of The Night’,
‘The Sun Is Dead’ and ‘City
Of Gold’ are pretty lacking but are easily
made up by the Matt Heafy dominated ‘Defenders’,
the completely whacky ‘Extraction Zone’
which features computer game style sounds which
sounds like a massive mixture of Donkey Kong meets
Super Mario and any other retro game which dominated
the members of Dragonforce’s childhood.
The album comes to a close with a cover of Johnny
Cash’s ‘Ring Of Fire’ and you
have to give Dragonforce kudos for taking such
a serious sounding song which is so different
from their genre and making it their own full
of speed and so listenable.
If you are a hardcore Dragonforce fan or a fan
of power metal and fast and furious guitar riffs
then ‘Maximum Overload’ is the album
for you, it stays true to the bands older material
but also becomes slightly heavier at moments thanks
to the guest appearance from Matt Heafy who has
happened to give Dragonforce a much needed kick
up the arse.
3.5/5
Review by Trigger
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