According to singer Sebastian “Seeb” Levermann this, the seventh album from Orden Ogan is “stripped down”. I guess, in the world of power metal, all things are relative, right?
They know what they are doing, these boys, and everything that is good about them is all present and correct on the opener “King Of The Underworld”, which bursts out of the traps with no introduction.
“The Order Of Fear” – and it sort of seems redundant to say – is happier with its fists up in the air, and “Moon Fire” is, never mind anything else, a “proper” exploration as to what “metal” should sound like.
And this is where this gets interesting. Because faced with writer’s block at the start of the album, they did something unconventional. There’s a fan in Uruguay who celebrates his love for the band by doing covers of their material, and they roped him in.
Evidently, it was a fruitful collaboration because the likes of “Conquest” crackle with energy, and I’d venture so far as to say that if you don’t like “Blind Man”, then you don’t like metal.
“Prince Of Sorrow” gets bonus points for starting with a guitar solo, and when they get harder-edged as on “Dread Lord” they are genuinely superb.
“The Order Of Fear” is a concept record, continuing the story of Alister Vale, a character who often features in their work. It continues the story of their 2015 album, “Ravenhead”, but as I always say at these moments, whether you buy into that or not, the test is whether the songs stand up on their own, and in the case of everything here – not least the grandiose ballad “My Worst Enemy”, the answer is unequivocally, yes.
The orchestral bombast that so informs their work is right there occasionally on this one, not least on the brilliant epic “Anthem To The Darkside” – arguably the best thing here (although there’s plenty of competition).
In keeping with the reflective feel, they re-record a track that has been knocking around since 2017, and “The Long Darkness” fits perfectly in with what they are trying to do here, giving the album an anthemic end. Festival fields are made for this type of thing.
Orden Ogan are a phenomenon, their last one got to number three on the official German album charts, and this is destined to do the same. In a world where heavy metal is always bigger and more important than it is ever given credit for, then “The Order Of Fear” is the embodiment of why it will never die.
Rating 9/10
