Gosh I do not think I know any Metal band from Iran, or say I knew, until I received the "Saved From The Truth" album by ANGBAND for a review. This is their third effort since the beginning of the band as a one man project in 2004. They come from the capital of Iran, Tehran and they play Progressive / Power Metal. For those who wonder what ANGBAND is in the language of Sindarin (the language of the elves) means "Iron Fortress" and was the fortress of the most powerful Ainur, Melkor, in middle Earth.

Listening through the nine songs of the record I saw a band that guitar wise resembles bands like ICED EARTH with triplets in their riffs, and sticking generally at a medium tempo though there are even blast beats at some point. There are lots of changes in the songs but do not expect to find any crazy rhythm changes or 5/8 time signature. There are also two ballads found in the record, "Angel" and "Bitter Truth" and the instrumental track "Persia". The vocals are mellow and sorrowful but in the high octaves the singer sounds really weak expect those times when there are dual melodies and it is not that obvious and there are also some death growls. If I have to pick any songs from this record I would definitely pick "Seasons Of My Pain" and "Fearless Dream" (the singer reminds of KING DIAMOND here and there!).

"Saved From The Truth" is a more than decent record Power Metal record. What makes it special is that the band is coming from a country that Metal bands are few and far between but to the best of my knowledge it has a very rich traditional music. That in my opinion is also their big chance that they are missing in this record. Instead of trying to play like bands from the west, filter all these influences and fuse them with their traditional music. Some traditional drums are not enough to make the difference. Finally while the production is adequate and mixing and mastering was handled by Achim Kohler of the ACCEPT fame in Germany there seems to be a lot of things that can be changed in the production phase so that the band can appear more solid and the result much more polished (handling of vocals, control over organs etc).