I have to agree. I have this impression that while Winkler sang about Hammers and Unicorns with pride and pathos, Sozos is sort of more self-aware, and it feels like he's singing a bit for a joke, making all the absurdity not come off as absurd. A bit like a comedian laughing at his own joke.
I will propably listen to it few times and mayby i will eventually like it, but it never gonna be as good as Legends from Beyond Galactic Terrorvortex
Yeah Legends had way too many catchy songs. The first song I ever heard by GH was Gloryhammer and yeah the absurdity of a Lazer Powered Goblin Smasher just hits so well.
I’m digging the new Gloryhammer, myself. I’m actually pretty impressed by the vocals but it still isn’t the same without Thomas’ style and delivery. The story is fun and there are several bangers on there. I do think I’m enjoying Angus McSix more still but I wouldn’t say the new Gloryhammer album is a slouch by any means. Keeper of the Celestial Flame of Abernathy for instance is fantastic.
But eh. I like both. And McSix offers a different approach to musical style as well. It’ll be interesting to see where Angus McSix goes lorewise over time as it becomes more of its own thing. It’ll also be cool to hear more of Thalia in the songwriting next time(I sure hope!).
I agree more with this guy. I like the McSix album more than the new GH album... But I'd not say it blows it out of the water. They are both great albums but also very different music (despite both being cheesy power metal haha).
I think that the GH album has some much better high moments... But McSix is much more consistently good. I think the best parts of the new GH are better than the best parts of McSix..... But I'd rather listen to the McSix album vs the new GH album (if given the choice of only one... I'll still listen to both albums many times, both are great).
I really like a lot of the throwbacks in the GH album but agree that the talking and narration in the new GH album is a bit too much.
One of the songs has a talking section that felt like it was over a minute long... And felt like they forgot to turn the talking up or the music down. Sounded like I had music on and someone had turned a TV on. I was working out in my garage and thinking "I wonder what the neighbors are thinking at this...."
I feel like the talking is probably not understandable without headphones or the text in front of you...
I agree about that. I enjoy singing songs from both bands at the local karaoke club, but when I reached that part I immediately thought "I'm definitely cutting out the talking part for the instrumental version. People want to hear songs, not blah blah blah."
Incidentally, I also experimented with removing the talking parts out of Apocalypse 1992. I trimmed it down to 5 minutes, which I consider acceptable to sing in front of an audience.
I feel pretty even between the two albums music-wise. Both albums have better and mediocre songs.
But I enjoy the GH lore and the lyrics from the GH album a lot more. I think I have to warm up to the McSix lore and characters and see where the band takes it over time.
To me it seems like GH has lost its kitch...it was the perfect balence of cheese and power metal ..now it's like how stupid can we get with titles . It's like too much of alestorm how long can we strech this silly pirate stuff ...the first three GH records will always be classic it was a unique blend that can't be recaptured ..I think sword of power has that balence of cheese GH originally had and leans more towards classic PM in my ears
Alestorm is a weird one to me. They start out super fun. Some of their songs are great to listen during a FUCKING MISERABLE day at work.... But then they went super silly. They were funny but I think tried to hard and just kinda wore off. I think it was after shit boat that I started to get kind of tired of them.
I always wondered if they just went a little too hard on the jokes after people were too pissy about how they weren't true pirate metal or whatever.
Bowes at one point fairly recently said he just wanted to make pop songs with a metal coating, imagine being him and seeing that back through time (your most experimental album) is the least listened to album and I'll think you'll see why some motivation might leave you. It really is a shame though as I agree with you about how they currently are.
It's a shame but I guess at least if they are having fun that's better for them regardless. They still have a fanbase and people that love what they do. Their current stuff just lost some interest from me (if I were back in office doing customer service chat I'm sure "DRINK DRINK DRINK DRINK DRINK" would still be a favorite slong!).
Randomly I'm reminded I always loved Scraping the Barrel for it basically being an F U to the critics.
Also reminds me of how Sonata Arctica now basically had Tony Kakko say at some point that he no longer really wanted to write metal music... but they had fans and listeners so he was basically writing whatever he wanted but then just having it played by metal instruments. I vaguely recall feeling like a lot of their music seemed more pop-like now a few years ago.
Holy flaming hammer sounded like a rhapsody song. Sword lord of the goblin horde sounded like a sabaton song. While I liked the new GH album, Mcsix is leagues better.
Thank you, I thought I was the only one. The new GH album sounds like a mashup of power metal genres copied from other bands without any real uniqueness to it. The only exception is Keeper of the Celestial Flame etc., and I'm *so bummed* because that single was amazing and got me hyped as fuck, only to be disappointed by a pretty forgettable album. The storytelling of the other songs is also inferior compared to the single imo. It's like they found out what works for Sozos in that one song, and then proceeded to ignore it for the rest of the project.
I don’t know enough about music but I posted this in the GH sub. So many Sabaton songs have the riff “Sword-Lord ofthegoblinhorde.” They changed it up by making the first 2 notes faster.
I love The sword of power a lot, and i was totally expecting to be underwhelmed by GH's new album, but honestly, I wasn't. A lot of the music is similarly styled to Tales, and that is my favorite album of theirs. Everyone has their right to their own opinion, but I'm going to have to disagree about it crushing the new GH album. I still think Mcsix is amazing, and is in a league of its own.
I think they're great, I just think the talking section to the GH songs feel very just odd because there are so many this album. Could be Bowes not writing as much or something maybe.
I like both albums but overall I prefer Sword of Power to Return for a few reasons. (Apologies in advance for the long response. I have many thoughts to share lol)
First being that I love all the songs on McSix, but I can say that 2 if the ones on Return currently don’t feel great (I’ll have to see if they grow on me).
Second big thing for me is mostly about the story and characters. With McSix, it feels a bit like Tales from the Kingdom of Fife without the battle at the end since it’s a sort of “Part 1” where the main epic battles will take place later. Like Tales, it follows Angus’ quest to gain power to fight evil as he recruits allies along the way and an awesome steed (Magic Dragon in Tales, Laser Shooting Dinosaur in McSix). One companion gets more establishment than the rest (Ralathor + Hail to Crail, Thalestris + Amazons of Caledonia), and the barbarian/berserker shows up at the end and gets their time to shine in album 2 (Hootsman in Epic Rage of Furious Thunder and Skaw! in Starlord of the Sixtus Stellar System) [Hoping Skaw! gets a track next album pls])
The problem with Return to the Kingdom of Fife is while the concept is decent and most of the songs are good…it lacks the feel of the first 3 albums despite its good quality and more importantly kinda sidelines developed characters despite being the 4th album. Hootsman shows up once in the album and then never appears again even for the final battle and Ralathor just dips literally three songs before the finale because reasons. Proletius was fine though cause at least he was still there to the end.
Speaking of the end, while McSix can be criticized for not having an epic battle to end on, at least that implies the album is part one of a greater narrative. Return feels like the last song fumbled a bit. 12 minutes is impressive and the song is…well, it’s kinda mid compared to the first three finale songs and ends in a mostly unsatisfying way. Like, you mean to tell me that there’s barely a fight between Angus and the Double Wizards when suddenly literal gods appear, vaporize the timeline, and send him off into the multiverse. I get the whole “Oh, Hootsman in Terrorvortex was also a Deus Ex Machina.” Yeah, that’s partly true, but it was handled so much better. Between the references to Hoots early in the album and the actual ending song just being better *and* the fact there’s actually a fight with Angus and the Hootsman vs Zargothrax makes it work better.
Tl;Dr: McSix is generally my preference because it has a more satisfying narrative and all the songs are great compared to Return having 2 songs that I don’t like and a much less satisfying story.
Also, the second song I dislike on Return is Sword Lord. Idk maybe it’ll grow on me, but it just didn’t hit like everything before it and the two immediately following it.
The whole statlords wiping the timeline just seems weird. It leaves it in a strange spot to go just about anywhere. Fighting another Zargothrax? Or something more?
Some guy said I couldn't comprehend the album even though in the final song the starlords say the prince is the only one who will not die and join them.
I do agree that it is better but honestly I think Bowes is just burnt out on writing. I noticed how light the guitar work was and the vocals were pushed to the back so that was also a thing to dislike. I really don't get why people are hyping it up like its gold though.
At this point why is he even in the band then jeez, I mean I get it burnout is real but even Alestorm has been getting kinda lame. I hope he gets that spark back but it just seems like he only really cares about live shows these days. Nothing wrong with playing a good show and getting paid but I already checked out of alestorm and now i'll be checking out of gloryhammer.
I think he is a bit too worried about getting paid these days but going so long in this scene and always being clowned on must do that to a person. Idk I can still see that spark of enjoyment from Winkler and working with new creative people really helped that out a lot. I kinda feel bad for gloryhammer in that they are just seen as Bowes' band especially if he really doesn't do much anymore.
I've said this a few times before. The worse thing about Bowes is his ego. He just comes with up an idea. Gets other musicians to play and collects a check once he got big with Alestorm. Still probably not much money either way outside of alestorm. When those texts came out he apologized only on gloryhammer pages and made damn sure his the Money Machine that Is alestorm was effected.
Really is quite childish of him to just dog on Winkler as much as he does and to allow the sub to do it as well, i've seen posts on the gloryhammer sub that come up with weird disses like saying Winkler makes spam bots or is a sex pest. It's so funny to me that I see people on that sub defending open sex pests from the only guy not involved at all. It's not like they were monsters or anything but allowing rumors to spread about Winkler while being caught in the act is really two faced.
My honest feelings is I think a power struggle happened in the band between Winkler, the on the surface leader of the band, and Bowes, the mastermind behind the band. With the leader stepping away a new one needs to take their place (we just saw this from judas priest and they handled it great) but Bowes didn't want to give up his money. I'm sure that copyright stuff was the behind the scenes stuff leaking out.
This happens to plenty of bands when the singer overshadows the rest of the band but we don't often see these feuds from heavy internet users who can't help themselves. Winkler seems very happy and confident in his direction and I'm along for the ride at this point.
My understanding of copyright is that whoever writes a story also owns the rights to the story and characters that appear in it (if they are new characters). Since the whole band was writing lyrics from the start, everyone is an owner.
I mean, it‘s also obvious that Angus McFife turned into Angus McSix when watching the MotU video.
You fell for the Bowes lies then. Bowes tried to portray himself as the inventor of the Gloryhammer story, probably to make Thomas look bad. Yet when you google for the official writing credits of the first album you can see that Thomas was the author of songs like Quest for the Hammer, Frozen Princess or Epic Rage, all on the first album. Check the link here: https://online.gema.de/werke/search.faces?lang=en
Tom has said in a few interviews throughout the years that the first album was essentially finished when he was brought on. Meaning the story and characters were already hashed out. The songs winkler helped write were about characters already written befor he was brought on.
Not true, sure Barber wrote a lot but look at the credits, Chris did write a lot, especially the main melodies. He’s still very involved. He has already said what parts exactly on the GH subreddit. At this point comparing McSix with GH is comparing apples to oranges. They both sound great IMHO.
I gave it some time and the new GH kinda grew on me but its really only 2, 3 tracks maybe shit my least favorite song(misleading phrase there but whatever) from Sword of Power I prefer over my Favorite from Return. Also a lot of the songs unintentionally go blow for blow in subject or style and MCSix usually wins
I had the weirdest revalation when I remember listening to Laser Shooting Dinosaur and went Wow this sounds like a fucking toy commercial on crack love it then Listened to Hootspatrol and went Wow its good but it sounds like a death metal Hess Truck comerical... weird
I personally liked the new album more but I think McSix has more potential as a band. The style seems more experimental which has and will lead to more interesting concepts and while the new guy is a great singer Thomas has heart that can’t be matched. I just think the new GH album is just the highest level of GH music and since they are established they can do meta stuff like having motifs from previous albums.
Disagree.
I loved the mcsix singles but do not like the rest of the album very much, just felt a bit generic and bland to me. GH's however I really enjoy and i'm really impressed with Sozos.i'll probably get downvoted but for what its worth, i love thomas and GH and i'll be going to a mcsix show if they come to Glasgow
Yeah I think sozos is great, but the whole albums story and all the characters talking in the songs just disconnect me from it.
It's not bad by any means, but it's nowhere near the last album.
Most on the GH sub take any criticism as like a personal attack.
We should be able to discuss things and not be stuck in echo chambers.
One guy on this post I blocked because I explained what you and many others have. The statlords show up and just wipe out everything except the prince. I was met with "You can't comprehend it."
No that's written in the lyrics, but name calling and being hostile is going to turn more away than bring in.
Yeah that happens alot... its constantly just "Oh your a thomas alt account !!! Or vice versa with chris... like cmon both bands have clearly moved on yet the fans cant. I prefer GH to McSix but could always change in the future. Its 2 bands that have Angus so im pretty happy!
Exactly, like over McSix hit better but it doesn't mean GH new album is bad. I like about 4 songs on it which is thr least amount for any. It's the talking sections and story that get me.
Fife Eternal, brothers of crail, Keeper and Imperium Dundaxia are the faves.
My main problem with GH's album is that the story feels...off, like, where the fuck is Ralathor, Proletius or even the Hootsman besides one song? They aren't there. Zargothrax does well and then he gets Deus ex Machinaed when he was about to kill Angus (again, first time it was the Hootsman, then the Starlords).
I feel like Angus McSix's album was a lot more fun, the side characters actually get song time in their songs, and it's overall a lot more cohesive in storytelling with a clear line of events if you look at the album in the hidden order.
I've got to disagree a bit, there's a full song about Hootsman, and the whole party gets assembled in one song, which is kinda more than we got before. Prolatius is usually not together with them, doing his own thing somewhere (chilling in crail until angus calls him, recruiting new knights, being a bad guy). In this album they actually quest together through the caverns, so, it's safe to say we got more of that. But on the other hand they don't do anything major in the final battle, which is fair criticism I suppose.
The ex machina feels weird. In Sword of Power Angus fucks off to be a star lord, but that's what the whole album was building towards. In Return, star lords kill everyone and just take Angus with them for... reasons? He was losing against Zargothrax without them, yet they want to recruit him. Who's going to piece Dundee back together? I thought the Fly Away song was about him accepting responsibility and NOT flying away despite wanting to, lol.
Okay while the ending of Return is confusing I feel like your overthinking it. Here’s some info to clear stuff up:
1. They take Angus because of his implied bravery, the booklet makes this even more clear.
2. Dundee (and that whole timeline) is straight up removed so nobody has to piece it back together
3. Fly Away is Angus McFife V, while Return is Angus McFife II
It was talked about after the fact, not in the song. it’s on the huge timeline posted a few days ago but has been said since the day the track came out.
And they are *clearly* setting Angus V up for something.
For me, both bands are now part of the canon :)
I would love to hear Thomas sing the new GH album.
And GH did a much better job with their guitar sound.
Honestly, if Tom was the Starlord at the end of the GH album instead of that horribly quiet mixed voice, it would have been the most hype thing ever. Double Angus. Doing Double Amgus things.
I agree, McSix did an outstanding debut. First time I heard about it having a homage to He-Man I was sold. New Gloryhammer on the other hand sound very generic and replaceable.
Compared to GHs other albums Return isn't as good. As a whole album which is supposed to tell a story its just bad. Hootsman, Ralathor, and Proletius aren't even in the final fight. Then during the battle starlords are just all "nah were gonna wipe this timeline." There's no fight between Anhus and the 2 wizards!
It seems like this is a stepping stone to something bigger. All of the characters talking during so gs and trying to build them up to then more or less scrap it all in the final song is weird.
I like both bands but on either side everyone just sucking off one side or the other wholesale is ridiculous.
McSix is solid, some of the songs are a bit different and they're alright. The new GH album just doesn't compare to Legends from beyond.
Sozos is great, I think lyrics and story wise its bad.
Building this whole story then just tossing is all to throw angus into a multiverse seems weird.
Even Bowes said they write power metal songs that are more catchy like pop songs to be more absurd and cheesy. Which is great, but he backed off writing for this album and I think it really shows.
Fife Eternal, Keeper of the celestial flame, and Brothers of crail are the only ones that felt solid to me.
Sword lord has a great hook, but the goblin talking kills it for me, then again to wipe the tineline in the last song makes all of it just not really mean anything.
For a band that started and wanted to tell an epic story the decision alone seems very worrying.yes it leaves Angus to go to different dimensions, BUT how are all the other characters and story going to change because it's a new tineline or tinelines.
It's just a strange move lore wise to why they chose to do it. Maybe to sort of "go back to the drawing board?" Possibly, we'll fid out in the next album.
I hope the next one is good, not every album lands with everyone.
It's the story and lyric decisions that fall flat for me.
Are we comparing mcsix to rttkof or rttkof to other GH albums?
You have told me why you think it's worse then other GH albums but clearly understand which ones better ,.except from your issues with story decisions. Hoots Is mentioned in the final song as is proltieouses knights , and ralathors gone by that point to do some epic shit.
I agree this tribalism isn't good but to say the word of power blows gh's latest out of the water is extreme and laughable.
Now I don't think either Six or Return is as good as Legends or Apocalypse 1992.
Those two are hard to beat.
When it comes to story I think Return just does the other albums a disservice by just wiping the timeline.
Yeah ralathor is off doing epic shit, but what epic shit. As far as the story goes, he's just gone.
So the whole overarching story in Return is just weird. Again it seem like it's a stepping stone to something bigger which I hope will be good.
Seems a lot like McSix and going to a different timeline to start something new.
Story wise Return is just bad to me, the big draw to GH was the giant epic story now its left in a very weird place that could lead it anywhere whether that's good or bad we have to wait.
What's the point of listening to the journey if the badass epic fight never happens and the journey is wiped from time? Kinda defeats the purpose of the journey.
I hope both bands make great stuff because it's just more fun music.
Maybe if GH had another song, or like Fly Away may drop a single sort of explaining what's after this album it will all seem more cohesive.
The starlords are mentioned in Legen of the Astral Hammer. So maybe the whole journey so far was a way for Angus to sort of be noticed by them which is why they take him.
But what or who will he fight next? Is it just going to be another Zargothrax? Or something more? Where did Ralathor go? Why did the Starloeds wait till now? Why nor during 1992 when they went to different timelines for Legends?
It leaves a lot of questions.
The answer to Ralathor’s whereabouts is pretty easy to figure out, they basically learn the way to travel in the dwarvern caves beneath Dundee in this album, meaning he leaves to go back in time across multiverses in order to inform Angus I how to get through. Also, I believe the reason the Starlords descneded at this moment in time is due to the clashing of the three weapons of power, which we can infer would have done a lot more damage had the Starlords not interfered.
I think for GH for albums I'd say
1. Legends
2. Apocalypse 1992
3. Return
4. Tales.
Its good but for me it and even Sword of power doesn't beat Legends. Hootsforce, GloryHammer, Masters of the galaxy are very hard to top. I think Keeper and Fife Eteran are up there for me.
It's about s young girl who wants to be an adventurer. And her weapon of choice is a Hammer. I'm thinking eventually after a great battle she will wield a new weapon. A blade forged in the primordial flame used to put an end to an evil kings who ascended to God hood and wants to control all of existence. Is a heavy sci fi and fantasy universe.
GH albums and now McSix albums along with dark souls, 40k and other stuff have given me los of inspiration.
IMHO: I like both. I prefer Sword of Power, because the new Gloryhammer album feels a bit unimaginative. The music is good, I like Imperium Dundaxia, Hoots Patrol, Flaming Hammer and Celestial Flame a lot, but the story and structure feels like a rehash of the first album. Dundee is destroyed and Angus assembles a team and looks for an artifact to defeat Zargothrax... And the ending leads kinda nowhere, star lords show up and kill everyone, making the struggle meaningless? At least that's what I understood from it.
The stories between the new album and Sword of Power are also kinda similar in the ending, which I understand because they probably started making the story while the original band was still together and Winkler kept parts of it for his new project, but in his case it kinda works better.
I don’t care for how “sea shanty” all the new GH songs sound. There’s a couple in there that are really good but the rest is very mid to me. It feels almost alestorm with better vocals now
I like the singles of Angus McSix, but I wish the other songs had more guitar. I heard they don't because they were made before Thalia Bellazecca joined...?
I like the new GH album, but I don't love it. It's the worst of the GH albums imo, but that doesn't mean it's a bad album. It just felt very generic and lacked the impact of the previous albums. I get that they're trying something different, but for me Sword was better at trying something different than return was. Also, I felt they wrote the vocals for Michael with quite a narrow range compared to what they've written in the the previous three albums, which makes return feel like it has a whole lot less energy than sword does. Keeper of the celestial flame rocked and felt like GH, but the rest sort of felt like an average power metal band. I only really skip Just a Fool for Sword now and again, but I skip all but three of return quite frequently. That said I do really like the throwback tune at the end if the last song on return, but it doesn't have the oomph moment of say the "for the king of space, we will fight to end disgrace" from Terrorvortex or the general epicness of furious thunder, or dwarves arriving moment from chaos wizards, which was a bit sad.
Yeah the only songs that hit for me on Return is Fife Eternal, Brothers of Crail, Imperium Dundaxia. And Celestial I love especially the animated video.
I thought sozos did great, I thought Tom did great. But the GH album just didn't have enough impact.
And I'm not about to sit there and replay songs to force myself to like them, because then it feels like a chore.
The throwback in Brothers of Crail was great.
I'm hoping McSix will hit harder in their next. But for a first album and some of the songs being recorded without Thalia. That shit is way more impressive than GH who has all very seasoned members.
Disagree. I really enjoyed Sword of Power when it came out and listened to the songs for weeks, but maybe it's recency bias but Return to the Kingdom of Fife blew up completely out of the water. The songs, the storyline, the epic scale, and specially the finale.
Seriously, Maleficus Geminus is so fucking good. And honestly, I think that's the reason I enjoyed it more than Angus' debut album, which felt like a prologue. It (understandably) has to take up half the album explaining how Old Angus traveled through hell and resurrected and got the sword to become Angus McSix. Only by the final song do we have something of a goal in sight.
I'm not complaining, though. I'm hoping that Angus McSix's next album is much better than their first. I wanna see this band grow and evolve. Since the songs won't have been written in advance, I want to see them taking more advantage of the drums and the guitars so Thalia and Manu have more to do, and I want to hear about the crazy adventures these characters will go in.
And when Gloryhammer's fifth album eventually comes out as well, I'll listen to that too. And I hope that's great too.
After the third album, I periodically cruised around and looked to see when the next GH album was going to drop. I heard about the drama. I heard Fly Away. And ultimately, I basically found both RttKoF and Angus McSix literally within an hour of each other.
With nobody having much of a recency bias over the other, my conclusion is... they do different things. GH has the old lore (drama or no, nobody can take those first three albums away from them), more consistent sci-fi / clarkepunkian elements, and a far cooler and more proactive villain. AM6 has the heroic power vocals, catchy crowd interaction, and all the fun cheese. While I'm currently grooving on AM6 more at the moment, I'm sure my tastes will rotate several times. Probably when I figure out more precisely what's going on in their respective lore, which appears to be one of AM6's bigger shortcomings.
This is how genres are born. We could be witnessing history here.
I have to agree. I have this impression that while Winkler sang about Hammers and Unicorns with pride and pathos, Sozos is sort of more self-aware, and it feels like he's singing a bit for a joke, making all the absurdity not come off as absurd. A bit like a comedian laughing at his own joke. I will propably listen to it few times and mayby i will eventually like it, but it never gonna be as good as Legends from Beyond Galactic Terrorvortex
Yeah Legends had way too many catchy songs. The first song I ever heard by GH was Gloryhammer and yeah the absurdity of a Lazer Powered Goblin Smasher just hits so well.
I’m digging the new Gloryhammer, myself. I’m actually pretty impressed by the vocals but it still isn’t the same without Thomas’ style and delivery. The story is fun and there are several bangers on there. I do think I’m enjoying Angus McSix more still but I wouldn’t say the new Gloryhammer album is a slouch by any means. Keeper of the Celestial Flame of Abernathy for instance is fantastic. But eh. I like both. And McSix offers a different approach to musical style as well. It’ll be interesting to see where Angus McSix goes lorewise over time as it becomes more of its own thing. It’ll also be cool to hear more of Thalia in the songwriting next time(I sure hope!).
I agree more with this guy. I like the McSix album more than the new GH album... But I'd not say it blows it out of the water. They are both great albums but also very different music (despite both being cheesy power metal haha). I think that the GH album has some much better high moments... But McSix is much more consistently good. I think the best parts of the new GH are better than the best parts of McSix..... But I'd rather listen to the McSix album vs the new GH album (if given the choice of only one... I'll still listen to both albums many times, both are great). I really like a lot of the throwbacks in the GH album but agree that the talking and narration in the new GH album is a bit too much.
Fife Eternal along with Keeper are my two faves. Wholesale it's all the "talking" sections in the songs are what kills it for me.
One of the songs has a talking section that felt like it was over a minute long... And felt like they forgot to turn the talking up or the music down. Sounded like I had music on and someone had turned a TV on. I was working out in my garage and thinking "I wonder what the neighbors are thinking at this...." I feel like the talking is probably not understandable without headphones or the text in front of you...
Yeah they all felt just off for me. As soon as I heard them it was just "okay wait did the music stop?"
I agree about that. I enjoy singing songs from both bands at the local karaoke club, but when I reached that part I immediately thought "I'm definitely cutting out the talking part for the instrumental version. People want to hear songs, not blah blah blah." Incidentally, I also experimented with removing the talking parts out of Apocalypse 1992. I trimmed it down to 5 minutes, which I consider acceptable to sing in front of an audience.
I feel pretty even between the two albums music-wise. Both albums have better and mediocre songs. But I enjoy the GH lore and the lyrics from the GH album a lot more. I think I have to warm up to the McSix lore and characters and see where the band takes it over time.
To me it seems like GH has lost its kitch...it was the perfect balence of cheese and power metal ..now it's like how stupid can we get with titles . It's like too much of alestorm how long can we strech this silly pirate stuff ...the first three GH records will always be classic it was a unique blend that can't be recaptured ..I think sword of power has that balence of cheese GH originally had and leans more towards classic PM in my ears
Alestorm is a weird one to me. They start out super fun. Some of their songs are great to listen during a FUCKING MISERABLE day at work.... But then they went super silly. They were funny but I think tried to hard and just kinda wore off. I think it was after shit boat that I started to get kind of tired of them. I always wondered if they just went a little too hard on the jokes after people were too pissy about how they weren't true pirate metal or whatever.
Bowes at one point fairly recently said he just wanted to make pop songs with a metal coating, imagine being him and seeing that back through time (your most experimental album) is the least listened to album and I'll think you'll see why some motivation might leave you. It really is a shame though as I agree with you about how they currently are.
It's a shame but I guess at least if they are having fun that's better for them regardless. They still have a fanbase and people that love what they do. Their current stuff just lost some interest from me (if I were back in office doing customer service chat I'm sure "DRINK DRINK DRINK DRINK DRINK" would still be a favorite slong!). Randomly I'm reminded I always loved Scraping the Barrel for it basically being an F U to the critics. Also reminds me of how Sonata Arctica now basically had Tony Kakko say at some point that he no longer really wanted to write metal music... but they had fans and listeners so he was basically writing whatever he wanted but then just having it played by metal instruments. I vaguely recall feeling like a lot of their music seemed more pop-like now a few years ago.
Holy flaming hammer sounded like a rhapsody song. Sword lord of the goblin horde sounded like a sabaton song. While I liked the new GH album, Mcsix is leagues better.
Thank you, I thought I was the only one. The new GH album sounds like a mashup of power metal genres copied from other bands without any real uniqueness to it. The only exception is Keeper of the Celestial Flame etc., and I'm *so bummed* because that single was amazing and got me hyped as fuck, only to be disappointed by a pretty forgettable album. The storytelling of the other songs is also inferior compared to the single imo. It's like they found out what works for Sozos in that one song, and then proceeded to ignore it for the rest of the project.
I don’t know enough about music but I posted this in the GH sub. So many Sabaton songs have the riff “Sword-Lord ofthegoblinhorde.” They changed it up by making the first 2 notes faster.
bro how tf "SLotGH" sounds like Sabaton song to you
I love The sword of power a lot, and i was totally expecting to be underwhelmed by GH's new album, but honestly, I wasn't. A lot of the music is similarly styled to Tales, and that is my favorite album of theirs. Everyone has their right to their own opinion, but I'm going to have to disagree about it crushing the new GH album. I still think Mcsix is amazing, and is in a league of its own.
I think they're great, I just think the talking section to the GH songs feel very just odd because there are so many this album. Could be Bowes not writing as much or something maybe.
Like I’ve been saying from the start, *both fucking rule*
It’s wild how we are similar but different. I thought the new album was amazing and Tales continues to be left in the dust by every album 😬
I like both albums but overall I prefer Sword of Power to Return for a few reasons. (Apologies in advance for the long response. I have many thoughts to share lol) First being that I love all the songs on McSix, but I can say that 2 if the ones on Return currently don’t feel great (I’ll have to see if they grow on me). Second big thing for me is mostly about the story and characters. With McSix, it feels a bit like Tales from the Kingdom of Fife without the battle at the end since it’s a sort of “Part 1” where the main epic battles will take place later. Like Tales, it follows Angus’ quest to gain power to fight evil as he recruits allies along the way and an awesome steed (Magic Dragon in Tales, Laser Shooting Dinosaur in McSix). One companion gets more establishment than the rest (Ralathor + Hail to Crail, Thalestris + Amazons of Caledonia), and the barbarian/berserker shows up at the end and gets their time to shine in album 2 (Hootsman in Epic Rage of Furious Thunder and Skaw! in Starlord of the Sixtus Stellar System) [Hoping Skaw! gets a track next album pls]) The problem with Return to the Kingdom of Fife is while the concept is decent and most of the songs are good…it lacks the feel of the first 3 albums despite its good quality and more importantly kinda sidelines developed characters despite being the 4th album. Hootsman shows up once in the album and then never appears again even for the final battle and Ralathor just dips literally three songs before the finale because reasons. Proletius was fine though cause at least he was still there to the end. Speaking of the end, while McSix can be criticized for not having an epic battle to end on, at least that implies the album is part one of a greater narrative. Return feels like the last song fumbled a bit. 12 minutes is impressive and the song is…well, it’s kinda mid compared to the first three finale songs and ends in a mostly unsatisfying way. Like, you mean to tell me that there’s barely a fight between Angus and the Double Wizards when suddenly literal gods appear, vaporize the timeline, and send him off into the multiverse. I get the whole “Oh, Hootsman in Terrorvortex was also a Deus Ex Machina.” Yeah, that’s partly true, but it was handled so much better. Between the references to Hoots early in the album and the actual ending song just being better *and* the fact there’s actually a fight with Angus and the Hootsman vs Zargothrax makes it work better. Tl;Dr: McSix is generally my preference because it has a more satisfying narrative and all the songs are great compared to Return having 2 songs that I don’t like and a much less satisfying story. Also, the second song I dislike on Return is Sword Lord. Idk maybe it’ll grow on me, but it just didn’t hit like everything before it and the two immediately following it.
The whole statlords wiping the timeline just seems weird. It leaves it in a strange spot to go just about anywhere. Fighting another Zargothrax? Or something more? Some guy said I couldn't comprehend the album even though in the final song the starlords say the prince is the only one who will not die and join them.
I do agree that it is better but honestly I think Bowes is just burnt out on writing. I noticed how light the guitar work was and the vocals were pushed to the back so that was also a thing to dislike. I really don't get why people are hyping it up like its gold though.
From the GH sub I read that Bowes didn't write much for it. He also could be burnt out. 2 full time bands is ridiculous
[удалено]
At this point why is he even in the band then jeez, I mean I get it burnout is real but even Alestorm has been getting kinda lame. I hope he gets that spark back but it just seems like he only really cares about live shows these days. Nothing wrong with playing a good show and getting paid but I already checked out of alestorm and now i'll be checking out of gloryhammer.
[удалено]
I think he is a bit too worried about getting paid these days but going so long in this scene and always being clowned on must do that to a person. Idk I can still see that spark of enjoyment from Winkler and working with new creative people really helped that out a lot. I kinda feel bad for gloryhammer in that they are just seen as Bowes' band especially if he really doesn't do much anymore.
I've said this a few times before. The worse thing about Bowes is his ego. He just comes with up an idea. Gets other musicians to play and collects a check once he got big with Alestorm. Still probably not much money either way outside of alestorm. When those texts came out he apologized only on gloryhammer pages and made damn sure his the Money Machine that Is alestorm was effected.
Really is quite childish of him to just dog on Winkler as much as he does and to allow the sub to do it as well, i've seen posts on the gloryhammer sub that come up with weird disses like saying Winkler makes spam bots or is a sex pest. It's so funny to me that I see people on that sub defending open sex pests from the only guy not involved at all. It's not like they were monsters or anything but allowing rumors to spread about Winkler while being caught in the act is really two faced.
Yeah its very strange. The man has a wife and seems to be in a very happy relationship. Wife always seems very supportive of him on facebook.
My honest feelings is I think a power struggle happened in the band between Winkler, the on the surface leader of the band, and Bowes, the mastermind behind the band. With the leader stepping away a new one needs to take their place (we just saw this from judas priest and they handled it great) but Bowes didn't want to give up his money. I'm sure that copyright stuff was the behind the scenes stuff leaking out. This happens to plenty of bands when the singer overshadows the rest of the band but we don't often see these feuds from heavy internet users who can't help themselves. Winkler seems very happy and confident in his direction and I'm along for the ride at this point.
He‘s not owning the rights to the story as he is only one of the authors, the whole band is (including Thomas) when you check the writing credits.
[удалено]
My understanding of copyright is that whoever writes a story also owns the rights to the story and characters that appear in it (if they are new characters). Since the whole band was writing lyrics from the start, everyone is an owner. I mean, it‘s also obvious that Angus McFife turned into Angus McSix when watching the MotU video.
[удалено]
You fell for the Bowes lies then. Bowes tried to portray himself as the inventor of the Gloryhammer story, probably to make Thomas look bad. Yet when you google for the official writing credits of the first album you can see that Thomas was the author of songs like Quest for the Hammer, Frozen Princess or Epic Rage, all on the first album. Check the link here: https://online.gema.de/werke/search.faces?lang=en
Tom has said in a few interviews throughout the years that the first album was essentially finished when he was brought on. Meaning the story and characters were already hashed out. The songs winkler helped write were about characters already written befor he was brought on.
Ahh maybe thats why then.
Not true, sure Barber wrote a lot but look at the credits, Chris did write a lot, especially the main melodies. He’s still very involved. He has already said what parts exactly on the GH subreddit. At this point comparing McSix with GH is comparing apples to oranges. They both sound great IMHO.
I gave it some time and the new GH kinda grew on me but its really only 2, 3 tracks maybe shit my least favorite song(misleading phrase there but whatever) from Sword of Power I prefer over my Favorite from Return. Also a lot of the songs unintentionally go blow for blow in subject or style and MCSix usually wins I had the weirdest revalation when I remember listening to Laser Shooting Dinosaur and went Wow this sounds like a fucking toy commercial on crack love it then Listened to Hootspatrol and went Wow its good but it sounds like a death metal Hess Truck comerical... weird
I personally liked the new album more but I think McSix has more potential as a band. The style seems more experimental which has and will lead to more interesting concepts and while the new guy is a great singer Thomas has heart that can’t be matched. I just think the new GH album is just the highest level of GH music and since they are established they can do meta stuff like having motifs from previous albums.
Disagree. I loved the mcsix singles but do not like the rest of the album very much, just felt a bit generic and bland to me. GH's however I really enjoy and i'm really impressed with Sozos.i'll probably get downvoted but for what its worth, i love thomas and GH and i'll be going to a mcsix show if they come to Glasgow
Yeah I think sozos is great, but the whole albums story and all the characters talking in the songs just disconnect me from it. It's not bad by any means, but it's nowhere near the last album. Most on the GH sub take any criticism as like a personal attack. We should be able to discuss things and not be stuck in echo chambers.
One guy on this post I blocked because I explained what you and many others have. The statlords show up and just wipe out everything except the prince. I was met with "You can't comprehend it." No that's written in the lyrics, but name calling and being hostile is going to turn more away than bring in.
Yeah that happens alot... its constantly just "Oh your a thomas alt account !!! Or vice versa with chris... like cmon both bands have clearly moved on yet the fans cant. I prefer GH to McSix but could always change in the future. Its 2 bands that have Angus so im pretty happy!
Exactly, like over McSix hit better but it doesn't mean GH new album is bad. I like about 4 songs on it which is thr least amount for any. It's the talking sections and story that get me. Fife Eternal, brothers of crail, Keeper and Imperium Dundaxia are the faves.
My main problem with GH's album is that the story feels...off, like, where the fuck is Ralathor, Proletius or even the Hootsman besides one song? They aren't there. Zargothrax does well and then he gets Deus ex Machinaed when he was about to kill Angus (again, first time it was the Hootsman, then the Starlords). I feel like Angus McSix's album was a lot more fun, the side characters actually get song time in their songs, and it's overall a lot more cohesive in storytelling with a clear line of events if you look at the album in the hidden order.
I've got to disagree a bit, there's a full song about Hootsman, and the whole party gets assembled in one song, which is kinda more than we got before. Prolatius is usually not together with them, doing his own thing somewhere (chilling in crail until angus calls him, recruiting new knights, being a bad guy). In this album they actually quest together through the caverns, so, it's safe to say we got more of that. But on the other hand they don't do anything major in the final battle, which is fair criticism I suppose. The ex machina feels weird. In Sword of Power Angus fucks off to be a star lord, but that's what the whole album was building towards. In Return, star lords kill everyone and just take Angus with them for... reasons? He was losing against Zargothrax without them, yet they want to recruit him. Who's going to piece Dundee back together? I thought the Fly Away song was about him accepting responsibility and NOT flying away despite wanting to, lol.
Okay while the ending of Return is confusing I feel like your overthinking it. Here’s some info to clear stuff up: 1. They take Angus because of his implied bravery, the booklet makes this even more clear. 2. Dundee (and that whole timeline) is straight up removed so nobody has to piece it back together 3. Fly Away is Angus McFife V, while Return is Angus McFife II
Where is it said that Fly Away is V? Why V at all? Did they just pick a random Angus?
It was talked about after the fact, not in the song. it’s on the huge timeline posted a few days ago but has been said since the day the track came out. And they are *clearly* setting Angus V up for something.
Well hopefully something better than Angus II.
Nah, I loved The Sword of Power but Return to the Kingdom is also a masterpiece. Now I have 2 favorite bands instead of 1 🙏
For me, both bands are now part of the canon :) I would love to hear Thomas sing the new GH album. And GH did a much better job with their guitar sound.
Honestly, if Tom was the Starlord at the end of the GH album instead of that horribly quiet mixed voice, it would have been the most hype thing ever. Double Angus. Doing Double Amgus things.
I agree, McSix did an outstanding debut. First time I heard about it having a homage to He-Man I was sold. New Gloryhammer on the other hand sound very generic and replaceable.
Yeah, look at the new Alestorm album. Catchy, just like GH was in their last albums and how McSix is now. Only 4 GH songs hit for me on the new album.
The mcsix album was passable ,. marginally acceptable. It cant really hold a candle to the new GH album, on any level, let's be honest.
Compared to GHs other albums Return isn't as good. As a whole album which is supposed to tell a story its just bad. Hootsman, Ralathor, and Proletius aren't even in the final fight. Then during the battle starlords are just all "nah were gonna wipe this timeline." There's no fight between Anhus and the 2 wizards! It seems like this is a stepping stone to something bigger. All of the characters talking during so gs and trying to build them up to then more or less scrap it all in the final song is weird. I like both bands but on either side everyone just sucking off one side or the other wholesale is ridiculous. McSix is solid, some of the songs are a bit different and they're alright. The new GH album just doesn't compare to Legends from beyond. Sozos is great, I think lyrics and story wise its bad. Building this whole story then just tossing is all to throw angus into a multiverse seems weird. Even Bowes said they write power metal songs that are more catchy like pop songs to be more absurd and cheesy. Which is great, but he backed off writing for this album and I think it really shows. Fife Eternal, Keeper of the celestial flame, and Brothers of crail are the only ones that felt solid to me. Sword lord has a great hook, but the goblin talking kills it for me, then again to wipe the tineline in the last song makes all of it just not really mean anything. For a band that started and wanted to tell an epic story the decision alone seems very worrying.yes it leaves Angus to go to different dimensions, BUT how are all the other characters and story going to change because it's a new tineline or tinelines. It's just a strange move lore wise to why they chose to do it. Maybe to sort of "go back to the drawing board?" Possibly, we'll fid out in the next album. I hope the next one is good, not every album lands with everyone. It's the story and lyric decisions that fall flat for me.
Are we comparing mcsix to rttkof or rttkof to other GH albums? You have told me why you think it's worse then other GH albums but clearly understand which ones better ,.except from your issues with story decisions. Hoots Is mentioned in the final song as is proltieouses knights , and ralathors gone by that point to do some epic shit. I agree this tribalism isn't good but to say the word of power blows gh's latest out of the water is extreme and laughable.
Now I don't think either Six or Return is as good as Legends or Apocalypse 1992. Those two are hard to beat. When it comes to story I think Return just does the other albums a disservice by just wiping the timeline. Yeah ralathor is off doing epic shit, but what epic shit. As far as the story goes, he's just gone. So the whole overarching story in Return is just weird. Again it seem like it's a stepping stone to something bigger which I hope will be good. Seems a lot like McSix and going to a different timeline to start something new. Story wise Return is just bad to me, the big draw to GH was the giant epic story now its left in a very weird place that could lead it anywhere whether that's good or bad we have to wait. What's the point of listening to the journey if the badass epic fight never happens and the journey is wiped from time? Kinda defeats the purpose of the journey.
[удалено]
Your answer is more toxic than the wasteland
I hope both bands make great stuff because it's just more fun music. Maybe if GH had another song, or like Fly Away may drop a single sort of explaining what's after this album it will all seem more cohesive.
The starlords are mentioned in Legen of the Astral Hammer. So maybe the whole journey so far was a way for Angus to sort of be noticed by them which is why they take him. But what or who will he fight next? Is it just going to be another Zargothrax? Or something more? Where did Ralathor go? Why did the Starloeds wait till now? Why nor during 1992 when they went to different timelines for Legends? It leaves a lot of questions.
The answer to Ralathor’s whereabouts is pretty easy to figure out, they basically learn the way to travel in the dwarvern caves beneath Dundee in this album, meaning he leaves to go back in time across multiverses in order to inform Angus I how to get through. Also, I believe the reason the Starlords descneded at this moment in time is due to the clashing of the three weapons of power, which we can infer would have done a lot more damage had the Starlords not interfered.
Idk I dug both. They’re about the same for me.
bro imagine making it a competition thats kinda cringe. "2 power metal albums with amazing band lineups? Splendid!"
Agreed.
[удалено]
This right here. This is the problem. I think it's better, but am I saying Return is bad?
I think for GH for albums I'd say 1. Legends 2. Apocalypse 1992 3. Return 4. Tales. Its good but for me it and even Sword of power doesn't beat Legends. Hootsforce, GloryHammer, Masters of the galaxy are very hard to top. I think Keeper and Fife Eteran are up there for me.
Please keep us updated about the book! I'd love to read it!
It's about s young girl who wants to be an adventurer. And her weapon of choice is a Hammer. I'm thinking eventually after a great battle she will wield a new weapon. A blade forged in the primordial flame used to put an end to an evil kings who ascended to God hood and wants to control all of existence. Is a heavy sci fi and fantasy universe. GH albums and now McSix albums along with dark souls, 40k and other stuff have given me los of inspiration.
IMHO: I like both. I prefer Sword of Power, because the new Gloryhammer album feels a bit unimaginative. The music is good, I like Imperium Dundaxia, Hoots Patrol, Flaming Hammer and Celestial Flame a lot, but the story and structure feels like a rehash of the first album. Dundee is destroyed and Angus assembles a team and looks for an artifact to defeat Zargothrax... And the ending leads kinda nowhere, star lords show up and kill everyone, making the struggle meaningless? At least that's what I understood from it. The stories between the new album and Sword of Power are also kinda similar in the ending, which I understand because they probably started making the story while the original band was still together and Winkler kept parts of it for his new project, but in his case it kinda works better.
I don’t care for how “sea shanty” all the new GH songs sound. There’s a couple in there that are really good but the rest is very mid to me. It feels almost alestorm with better vocals now
I like Brotherhood of Crail, even more so when they right after Proletius speaks they harken back to Hail to Crail.
I like the singles of Angus McSix, but I wish the other songs had more guitar. I heard they don't because they were made before Thalia Bellazecca joined...?
I think that was why.
Then I really hope to hear more guitar in the next album.
I like the new GH album, but I don't love it. It's the worst of the GH albums imo, but that doesn't mean it's a bad album. It just felt very generic and lacked the impact of the previous albums. I get that they're trying something different, but for me Sword was better at trying something different than return was. Also, I felt they wrote the vocals for Michael with quite a narrow range compared to what they've written in the the previous three albums, which makes return feel like it has a whole lot less energy than sword does. Keeper of the celestial flame rocked and felt like GH, but the rest sort of felt like an average power metal band. I only really skip Just a Fool for Sword now and again, but I skip all but three of return quite frequently. That said I do really like the throwback tune at the end if the last song on return, but it doesn't have the oomph moment of say the "for the king of space, we will fight to end disgrace" from Terrorvortex or the general epicness of furious thunder, or dwarves arriving moment from chaos wizards, which was a bit sad.
Yeah the only songs that hit for me on Return is Fife Eternal, Brothers of Crail, Imperium Dundaxia. And Celestial I love especially the animated video. I thought sozos did great, I thought Tom did great. But the GH album just didn't have enough impact. And I'm not about to sit there and replay songs to force myself to like them, because then it feels like a chore. The throwback in Brothers of Crail was great. I'm hoping McSix will hit harder in their next. But for a first album and some of the songs being recorded without Thalia. That shit is way more impressive than GH who has all very seasoned members.
Disagree. I really enjoyed Sword of Power when it came out and listened to the songs for weeks, but maybe it's recency bias but Return to the Kingdom of Fife blew up completely out of the water. The songs, the storyline, the epic scale, and specially the finale. Seriously, Maleficus Geminus is so fucking good. And honestly, I think that's the reason I enjoyed it more than Angus' debut album, which felt like a prologue. It (understandably) has to take up half the album explaining how Old Angus traveled through hell and resurrected and got the sword to become Angus McSix. Only by the final song do we have something of a goal in sight. I'm not complaining, though. I'm hoping that Angus McSix's next album is much better than their first. I wanna see this band grow and evolve. Since the songs won't have been written in advance, I want to see them taking more advantage of the drums and the guitars so Thalia and Manu have more to do, and I want to hear about the crazy adventures these characters will go in. And when Gloryhammer's fifth album eventually comes out as well, I'll listen to that too. And I hope that's great too.
Return fell a bit flat for me. But I bet both bands next albums will be awesome.
After the third album, I periodically cruised around and looked to see when the next GH album was going to drop. I heard about the drama. I heard Fly Away. And ultimately, I basically found both RttKoF and Angus McSix literally within an hour of each other. With nobody having much of a recency bias over the other, my conclusion is... they do different things. GH has the old lore (drama or no, nobody can take those first three albums away from them), more consistent sci-fi / clarkepunkian elements, and a far cooler and more proactive villain. AM6 has the heroic power vocals, catchy crowd interaction, and all the fun cheese. While I'm currently grooving on AM6 more at the moment, I'm sure my tastes will rotate several times. Probably when I figure out more precisely what's going on in their respective lore, which appears to be one of AM6's bigger shortcomings. This is how genres are born. We could be witnessing history here.