You would have to be particularly unobservant to fail to notice the planets aligning in recent times, as this much-vaunted comeback for Germany’s greatest ever exponents of the art of pure heavy metal thunder has gained momentum and started to generate sparks of excitement from the faithful. Everything about the way the band have conducted themselves and handled the recruitment of an authentic and long-term replacement for the talismanic Udo Dirkschneider has added to the near-chewable air of impending triumph, and once you factor in the involvement of renowned production guru Andy Sneap – a man who has built his reputation on making heavy metal bands sound both extremely heavy and admirably metal – Blood Of The Nations has been a mouth-watering prospect from conception to birth.

And what an entrance into the metal world this is, both for Accept and Mark Tornillo, their new frontman. Having shrewdly set out their stall with the thrillingly bombastic Teutonic Terror and its suitably bold and endearingly ludicrous video, they have grabbed this opportunity to revitalise their career and produced an album that is as definitively metal as anything since Priest’s Painkiller. Sneap’s production is a major factor here, of course. The guitars of Wolf Hoffmann and Herman Frank scythe and pulverise with precision and great force throughout these 13 powerhouse metal anthems, and the Baltes/Schwarzmann rhythm section seem to be operating on a sublime level of interpersonal chemistry that ensures that Accept sound both utterly contemporary and startling in their exuberance and aggression. Tornillo’s voice fits perfectly, too, with perceptible shades of Udo but an identity and phrasing that is all his own.

Ultimately, of course, a great Accept album needs great songs, and these are easily the equal of anything the band have written in two decades. Echoing the melodic muscle and stirring thump of past classics like ‘Metal Heart’ and ‘Fast As A Shark’, new gems like ‘Beat The Bastards’, ‘Pandemic’ and ‘Rollin’ Thunder’ have big hooks and big balls; the perfect blend of essential Accept hallmarks and vital, vivid freshness. Fans will spend a few years debating where Blood Of The Nations ranks in the Germans’ illustrious canon, but there can surely be little doubt that this is, at the very least, the best Accept album since Russian Roulette, and maybe even one to be regarded with the same reverence and pride as Restless And Wild or Balls To The Wall. Either way, they’re back and they’re on blistering form.