PRETTY MAIDS – Pandemonium

Pretty Maids from Denmark can look back on almost three decades of solid Rock, but after their eighties’ successes it became a bit quiet about them, which is no surprise knowing that some of their dozen albums were certainly a step down from the famous Future World. But with Paul Christensen and Kenneth Hansen (better known as Ronnie Atkins and Ken Hammer), the two original founding members of the band left, they never released a bad album either.

From the start of the title track to the end of “Breathless”, the new album Pandemonium is a strong statement that Pretty Maids still hold their ground. The album consists of ten excellent Melodic Metal tracks that may well make up the album to beat for this year’s throne in that genre. The arrangements are skillfully done, the many years of experience result in some almost perfect tunes, which may only be good songs if somebody else had done it, but in the hands of these Metal veterans the hymn “I.N.V.U.”, the unusually heavy “Cielo Drive” and even the comparatively mellow single release “Little Drops Of Heaven” just turn gold. Overall five of the songs on the album would justify nothing but the highest score for Pandemonium.

Towards the end, the album loses a bit of its drive. Except for the aforementioned “Cielo Drive”, the second part of the album certainly has good songs, but those pale in comparison to the perfect beginning. It is still not bad, and if those were the highlights of the album, it would still be recommendable to check out, but the band proves that they can even be better than that and set their own records right from the start of Pandemonium.

This is an unexpectedly great return for one of the oldest Metal bands from Denmark which should be on the shopping list of every fan of melodic, yet heavy, music.