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BRAINSTORM
Plague of Rats
2025 Reigning Phoenix Music

BRAINSTORM is the legendary German power metal quintet formed in 1989. The band is about to release their long-awaited 14th studio album (and first for Reigning Phoenix Music), Plague of Rats. Since 2021's Wall of Skulls, the band has welcomed new bassist Jim Ramses. He joins long-time members Andy B. Franck (vocals), Torsten Ihlenfeld (guitar), Milan Loncaric (guitar) and Dieter Bernert (drums).

After a brief instrumental intro, the band launches into "Beyond Enemy Lines", a pounding and uplifting track, which contains themes of war, hate, dealing with mental anguish and issues of trust. This song is classic BRAINSTORM! The next song, "Garuda (Eater of Snakes)" (video on KNAC.COM HERE) finds the band once again injecting Indian themes into their music, something they first did on 2003's Soul Temptation. Garuda is a Hindu deity, an eagle-like sun bird. This is a killer track, with chunky riffs throughout! The next song "The Shepherd Girl" begins with an Indian motif, and is inspired by Gitavoginda, a work composed by the 12th-century Hindu poet Jayadeva (originally written in Sanskrit). This is another interesting composition. "False Memories" is a fantastic driving power metal song in the band's classic style, complete with Andy's sublime overlapping vocal melodies.

"Your Soul That Lingers In Me" features guest (female) vocals from Elina Siirala, and the track "From Hell" features guest (male) vocals from Alex Krull, (both of LEAVES' EYES). Both songs are great additions to the album. "Masquerade Conspiracy" is a killer track; this song is fast-paced and full of double bass drumming and amazing guitar riffs and solos. "From Hell" might be the best song on the album. As previously mentioned, it features Alex Krull (who provides the death-style vocals) intertwined with Andy's clean vocals. Dieter's precision drumming on this song is magnificent. Torsten and Milan combine for some amazing riffs as well. This song totally works! "The Dark of Night" is more of a mid-tempo rocker, while "Crawling" features a nice "pleading" song style with shouted backing vocals. The album concludes with "Curtains Fall", which throws the gauntlet down at the end, and proclaims: "top this!" There is a bonus track cover of RICK SPRINGFIELD's 1985 hit "Celebrate Youth" that will be available on digipak and earbook only.

Conclusion: Plague of Rats finds BRAINSTORM trimming away the fat, resulting in one of their best albums of recent years. This is still one of the best power metal bands in the world, there's no doubt about it. Seeb Levermann's production and mix on this album are perfect and really sets the bar high. Artist Gyula Havanczak returns to deliver yet another quintessential BRAINSTORM album cover. I own all the band's releases, and I'll definitely be picking up physical product once again when it is released on February 28th.

Pre-order now at this link: https://brainstorm.rpm.link/plagueofratsPR

4.8 Out Of 5.0