Ancient Cross was formed in San Antonio, Texas in 1992, as a cover band. They soon gained a solid reputation as a live act, both doing covers and original material. So the first 10 years of existence saw the band develop their own sound. In 2002 they won a Battle of the Bands contest, and started to get serious about writing material for a debut album. In 2004 they recruited vocalist Michael Lance, and a year later Ancient Cross entered Monster Music Studio to record their first CD. It was released independently in 2006, but without any distribution the CD was very hard to obtain. Then in 2009 Stormspell Records released the album worldwide. Finally the world got to hear Ancient Cross powerful heavy metal.

ANCIENT CROSS (2006, 2009) STORMSPELL RECORDS (#106/1000)

I first discovered Ancient Cross through their MySpace page, and have been searching for this album ever since. The song "The Queen Is Dead" sounded fantastic to me, and it has graced many a compilation CD I've made for friends ever since. However, the bands independently released CD seemed impossible to obtain. Luckily Stormspell Records have now issued the CD for all metal fans to hear.

Ancient Cross is a traditional American metal band. The emphasis in the song writing is to create memorable songs. So rather then speeding through some double bass galloping bonanza, or hammering out riff after riff, Ancient Cross seems focused on the compositions as a whole. The songs range from slow, plundering numbers to faster ones. But for the most part this is mid-paced power metal. The CD only holds 8 tracks, but since most of them are over 5 minutes long, it still clock in at around 45 minutes. The result is an album that is as diverse at it is genre typical. The rhythm section is driving the songs forth, the guitars create melody and substance, while the powerful and epic vocals tops it all off. Ancient Cross reminds me of such different bands as (early) Savatage ("Teach The Child"), (early) Metal Church ("The Queen Is Dead"), Black Sabbath ("Breakdown") and epic length songs from Iron Maiden ("The Hourglass").

The highlights are many on 'Ancient Cross'. And the more I listen to the album, the more I am loving it. Traditional metal like this is scarce these days. So if you're a fan of classic American metal you should do yourself a favor and check out this CD. So a big thanks to Stormspell Records for making it available, even thought it is a limited run of only 1000 CD's.

Killer tracks: The Queen Is Dead, Teach The Child, Gates Of Hell, The Hourglass, Forsaken

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