I can’t recommend this album highly enough.

“In the graveyard for angels, in the Angels' Necropolis, is a tree which has grown mighty from absorbing the fluids from the angels’ decomposing corpses. Over time this tree has amassed angelic powers in its sap, powers sufficient to overthrow the very cosmos and tear open the gates of Heaven. For the fallen archangel Lucifer the sap of the tree offers endless possibilities to reign over eternity. He enters the Angels’ Necropolis, cuts the bark and drinks the sap, and then with his army of demons he wrenches open the gates of Heaven and makes war on God.”

So says vocalist/guitarist Thomas Eriksson of ‘Angels’ Necropolis’, the debut album from Sweden’s Year Of the Goat. Last year’s four-track EP ‘Lucem Ferre’ was a highly-regarded body of work, and the boys are back in town once more with a stunning full-length album. Put simply, in ‘Angels’ Necropolis’ Eriksson and his bandmates Per Brodesson and Don Palmroos (guitars), Poppe (keyboards), Tobias Resch (bass) and Fredrik Hellerstrom (drums) have crafted an album which not only takes on where ‘Lucem Ferre’ left off but expands the band’s horizons with a display of both magnificence and majesty. In a short space of time the Goatie boys have already established a sound which sets them apart from a number of other bands blending elements of Seventies’ progressive rock with contemporary metal; the lazy may lump them in with the likes of Ghost and Graveyard, but YotG have a distinctness to their sound, an edge which lifts them way above the rest of the pack.

The songs go from the sublime to the intense without a moment’s notice (‘Angels’ Necropolis’), hit you in the face with some beautifully fluid guitars (‘For The King’), boast a commercial accessibility (‘Spirits Of Fire’ – for which a video shoot is in the diary – and the recent 7” ‘This Will Be Mine’), display a wonderfully wicked NWOBHM vibe (‘A Circle Of Serpents’), and drip with malice and belligerence (‘Voice Of A Dragon’, which through a range of time-changes evokes the atmosphere of some early Black Sabbath classics). The attention-grabber though is certainly that title track, a precision-drilled masterclass in how to compose and perform an epic piece of music. At ten-and-a-half minutes, ‘Angels’ Necropolis’ demands full consideration from the off, and then literally explodes; the guitar work is forceful, the bass and drums intransigent and unyielding and the vocal phrasing melodic and catchy, and given the right exposure this song has the power to win over vast legions of new fans.

This is a great album, a truly great album, no doubt about it. Compelled as I am to see Year Of The Goat become megastars, I can’t recommend this album highly enough. And when I played it to our esteemed reviews editor he was soon seen rocking his socks off too. It’s the album of the year…

John Tucker