Black Majesty - The 10 Years Royal Collection

My feelings about compilations are dual, or paradoxal if you may. First, they are really attractive as a greeting card. I mean, if you don’t know a band so well, a compilation will bring you enough information about them. Unfortunately, it works both ways. Depending on what you hear, the information will be really enough once for all. On second though, it may lead you to anxiously get all the albums. Bottomline, my point is that compilations work fine to newcomers.

As the name says “The 10 Years Royal Collection” covers ten years of Black Majesty’s activity. In a band’s time, ten years is a lot of time. There are bands that don’t live that much. If they do, they may change a lot. There are lots of examples of bands that changed a great deal in ten years. Or less. Take Queensrÿche, for instance. There’s a huge gap between “The Warning” and “Rage For Order.” Other bands, though, stick firmly to a formula, or maybe to a cause, and go almost unchanged. To me, it really doesn’t matter. I like both. Black Majesty belong to the second type of band. “The 10 Years Royal Collection” shows a band firmly attached to a sonance they believe. We must respect that.

Make no mistake, what “The 10 Years Royal Collection” shows us is a ferocious power metal interwoven by many melodic passages. All the great features of the subgenre are present in Black Majesty music such as the great vocal, sharp and precise guitars and fast drumming. Black Majesty are a band that will please power metal fans. This two-disc edition shows a great piece of the band’s musical competence. All 31 songs received a neat production which gave them a shining armor – yeah, power metal songs have armors. In most of them you will recognize easyly their inspiration as in “Holly Killers” where the galloping bass, twin guitars, and epic chorus takes us to a clear Iron Maiden legacy. Well, no wonder at all, power metal owes a lot to Iron Maiden.

Black Majesty “The 10 Years Royal Collection” was released on September 14th via Limb Music.

Track Listing:

Disc 1:
01. Fall Of The Reich 5:16
02. Legacy 4:17
03. Sands Of Time 5:40
04. Dragon Reborn 6:03
05. Silent Company 4:26
06. Six Ribbons (Jon English Tribute) 3:20
07. Firestorm 5:26
08. Forever Damned 5:10
09. Into The Black 5:08
10. Tomorrowland 4:48
11. Far Beyond 5:24
12. Break These Chains 4:49
13. Wish You Well 4:21
14. Falling 4:40
15. Holy Killers 5:10
16. Edge Of The World 4:19
Disc 2:
01. Chasing Time 5:26
02. Guardian (Acoustic Version) 6:59
03. Kingdoms 4:15
04. Memories 5:37
05. Silent Company (Acoustic Version) 5:13
06. Two Hearts 4:35
07. Hunt For You 5:23
08. Shine 4:16
09. Lycan 4:50
10. Everlasting (Previously Unreleased) 4:55
11. Forever Damned (Live) 5:11
12. Dying Innocence (Demo) 4:49
13. Take Me (Demo) 4:21
14. Sands Of Time (Demo) 4:40
15. Journeys End (Demo)