Review by Xephyr for Ignited - Steelbound (2019)

Igniting A Dying Flame

It has to be a difficult, maybe even borderline impossible task to choose to play no bullshit, traditional Heavy Metal in the more modern Metal landscape. The genre has been explored and refined so much since the late 1970’s and early 1980’s that it’s slightly pigeonholed itself compared to other, more flexible genres. For better or worse, you know what you’re getting yourself into if a band says they’re playing Heavy Metal with zero other modifiers attached. Brazilian Heavy Metal stalwarts IGNITED attempt to put their best foot forward with a debut that may appeal to blind Heavy Metal loyalists, but loses itself to stagnant genre clichés and slightly lackluster sound design.

Chug is the name of the game throughout Steelbound and while IGNITED manage to lay down a few decent riffs, the more modern choices on the guitar tone and the mixing of the drums really don't do them any favors. The more aggressive, more distorted guitar sounds decent on sustained power chords, but it loses its luster and starts to sound generally low quality on a good portion of the riffs. Coupling that kind of tone with extremely loud and sharp sounding percussion isn’t exactly my favorite thing since you lose a ton of depth and heft from the chug, so Steelbound fell flat for me in that regard. There are a few songs where it works out, with “Pain”, “Steelbound”, and “Rotting” being written in a way that complements their overall sound. Even though these riffs go hard with the traditional Heavy Metal chug, there isn’t much else there to latch onto apart from the occasional solo, especially since most of their choruses resort to generic power chords in order to support the vocalist.

IGNITED vocalist is worth supporting though since he’s very much the backbone of Steelbound through and through. Denis Lima’s voice has a ton of character as he pulls inspiration from the likes of Judas Priest along with injecting some early Power Metal tendencies shown in the delivery of his higher range notes and overall theatrics. Even though Steelbound fails to have very many memorable or fun choruses, Lima’s performance kept me interested throughout the album apart from one or two duds. “Shining Void” and “Time”, the two ballads of the album, do a fantastic job of showcasing his overall range since he exists in his upper range for almost the rest of the time. Honestly, I’d go so far as to say I’d love to hear Lima on Avantasia; he has a ton of power and range that doesn’t necessarily get utilized to its fullest potential.

As much as I want to say Lima’s performance saves Steelbound, there isn’t much here past the bare minimum of a modern Heavy Metal album. “Living in the Dark” emerged as my clear favorite and I think this song alone shows that IGNITED have some promise since it feels like it fully utilizes Lima to create a memorable chorus alongside the rest of the band. Maybe Steelbound can give Heavy Metal diehards an injection of hope that there are still bands continuing the legacy, but I can’t see myself getting much more out of this one.