If you have around some 33 years, like MARAUDER have, you must be doing something right. They hail from Athens in Greece and are delivering their seventh full length album to us, which they have aptly named "Metal Construction VII". And yes, the apparent experience is palpable all through the album. the music they play is straight forward Heavy Metal, pure and simple. Well, I forget to say that they have opted to play the Epic version of it, so they will have you raise your arms, stand with your feet wide, thrust you chest forward and get ready for a Metal Battle with them.

No, MARAUDER are not singing about marches, battles or wars, but over a lot more mundane stuff. Topics that you and I might encounter in our daily lives. That really sits good with me in this case. And to be quite honest, they do that in a rather good way. The sound is perfect, the songs very pleasant and easy to listen to and easily very accessible. Maybe too much for my liking, as they don't present me with a challenge. They don't ask my brain to work at it to either like or dislike what I am hearing. They are confronting me with a fait accompli, as the French call it. A take it or leave it. You either like this or you don't, and that never will change.

That, my friends, is taking out more than half the fun out of discovering and deciphering the music that is entering your ears while you are listening to, in this case, "Metal Construction VII". Therefore MARAUDER have crushed the chance of any new fans going through the phase of having a growing sense of achievement when analysing and disassembling the different parts of the music in their own minds. Which is how you find out what your favourite kind of music is, which bands stand out for you. all that put together for me is what is not right with "Metal Construction VII". And that is a pity, but I feel that MARAUDER do have enough ability to make people connect with them, if they would occasionally add something off key, off balance, out of their comfort zone. It would have made "Metal Construction VII" into a good album instead of just a pleasant one. You only get one chance at a first impression, and MARAUDER could have done better, but also a lot worse.