Van Canto: Dawn of the Brave

The obvious place to start with much of Van Canto's output is the cover versions – seriously you haven't lived until you have heard somebody other than Eric Adams unleash the immortal words, "Manowar, Manowar living on the road…" as the Canto did on their Hero album. On Dawn of the Brave we get "The Final Countdown" (the intro and arrangement is kitsch beyond belief whereas the lead vocal is somewhat bland,) Bonnie Tyler/Jim Steinman's "Holding Out for a Hero" feels slightly odd without Tyler's husky tones but works really well and holds a candle to the cover by the mighty "Emerald Sun" from a couple of years ago. Finally there's "Paranoid" which is tremendous as it's always great to hear great songs sung well.

For the uninitiated Van Canto are an acapella metal band where all the sounds (except the drums) are made by the vocalists in the band – a metal version of the Flying Pickets (if you are a) middle-aged and b) from the UK.)Clearly the covers are the hook into the album but there are plenty of other reasons to give Van Canto the time of day – the lead single "Badaboom" for instance which fulfills all the generic conventions of epic power metal but in an acapella style. I defy anyone to listener to "Steelbreaker" and then not indulge in some serious fist pumping and that's the sign of an album which is doing just what it should do.

Track Listing:
1. Dawn of the Brave
2. Fight for Your Life
3. To the Mountains
4. Badaboom
5. The Final Countdown
6. Steelbreaker
7. The Awakening
8. The Other Ones
9. Holding Out for a Hero
10. Unholy
11. My Utopia
12. Into the West
13. Paranoid

Added: February 10th 2014
Reviewer: Simon Bray
Score:
Related Link: Band Website
Hits: 1838
Language: english

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