Back in my formative years, I, like many a spotty hormonal teenage boy, enjoyed fantasy. Demons and wizards, fair maidens locked in towers by evil mages, rescued by muscular sword wielding heroes, mainly it seemed so they could deflower the maiden themselves. The art of Frank Frazetta, The books Of Robert E Howard, and of course many many Heavy Metal bands, with their mystical album covers, by artist such as Rodney Matthews, Roger Dean and others. And of course, what felt like the endless stream of straight to videos, most of which showed great promise behind their covers, and their magical titles, almost always disappointing, with no story, dodgy effects, if any, terrible actors, a waste of your money in the video store.

And, unfortunately I have to say BLACK SWORD THUNDER ATTACK has the feel of one the videos from my youth. I mean with a name like that, they should be an assault to the ears, pillaging and raising villages to the ground, or storming the castle and killing the evil coven, saving the damsel, just in time to deflower her.  But that isn't what we get, we get the aural equivalent of the straight to video film. Lots of Promise, but the delivery is lacking.

On the plus points we get some great guitar playing and spirited drumming, but the package as a whole is lacking.  The muddy production lets it down.  I am repaired to cut that some slack, this being an advanced MP3 copy I'm listening to, but both through my headphones and on the car stereo, the sound was not crisp or defined.  Also I found the 4 songs to be very repetitive, so much so I wasn't sure which song I was listening to.  This might have been deliberate, thematic, acts or passages of a suite, but it wasn't portrayed that way to me.

The vocals were a disappointment.  Some of this would again be down to the mix, but they simply were not strong enough.  At this time in rock we are blessed with a lot of amazing women who can rock, either in the symphonic metal style, such as Floor Jansen or the death metal growling's of Alissa White-Gluz, or Lizzy Hale's power and passion. B.T.S.A's vocals lack the power and passion.

I really wish this had been better than it is.  I tried very hard to like it, and there is a spark there, as I mentioned the guitarist Chris can play, I just feel the execution has let them down.