Night of the Stormrider 1992

"This album is one of the reasons why Iced Earth are one of the great power metal legends. Everything about this album rocks - even the vocalist, John Greely, who was eventually fired - does a good job, although his vocal technique is rather standard.

The music is epic, yet quite aggressive, which is reflected in the aggressive-yet-catchy choruses (like "Fight on, grab on, StormRIDer, StormRIDer" or "This is the path that IIII CHOOOSE"). Although most of the songs are centered around Jon Shaffer's insanely fast galloping guitar riffs, the album is actually quite varied with a lot of changes, twists and turns (possibly owing to Shaffer's fascination with Iron Maiden).

"Night of the Stormrider" has been described as a thrash metal album; I don't know if I think it's thrash metal, but it certainly is more aggressive that your stereotypical power metal band. I also like how most of the epicness is achieved through the classic rock band instrumentation, and when keyboards and choir-effects are used (like in the opener), the degree of cheesiness is kept at an absolute minimum.

This album is an absolute must in any power metal collection."

"As with many IE albums, this is a concept album. THe theme is recurring through out Jon's albums - A man striving to redeem himself from past sins and mistakes he has made (In the Dark Saga this will be featured again). The production is "dirty" and fits the music. It has this 80's metal sound, very fast guitar riffs and high pitched vocals. THe opening and closing tracks are the best and most emotional tracks. IMHO, this is still their best album to date and it still has the old IE sound that began to change on Burnt Offerings and Dark Saga and completely changed on Something Wicked..."