Drum roll please … or maybe a hearty dose of blast-beats! Tis the season to commence the good, bad and ugly of 2014! Of course we’re talking about BravePicks 2014, where all the staff put their collective metal minds together to build the ultimate lists including individual Top 20s (new studio albums ONLY),  Top 5 Brave Embarrassments, Top 3 Concerts, What/Who Needs To Stop In 2015? and Metal Predictions For 2015.

BravePicks 2014

22) PRIMAL FEAR – Delivering The Black (Frontiers)

 

"I'm very happy with it," Sinner told BraveWords scribe Carl Begai in January of Delivering The Black. "There are subjects on the album that I like more than what we did before, and that's important for me because if there's no evolution in the band and no difference between albums I wouldn't be pleased. Mostly the evolution is in the songwriting and production, and it definitely shows. I think Unbreakable (from 2012) was the most successful Primal Fear album worldwide, so it wasn't the point to change the style of music or re-invent Primal Fear with a different approach. The next step after Unbreakable was to make this kind of music, which the fans love, even better. We worked hard on the guitar parts because the guitars are the main instruments in Primal Fear, pushing Randy (Black/drums) to a new level, and making Ralf (Scheepers/vocals) better than he ever was. Those were our targets." "The next step was the recording and the mix, which had to be a little different in our ears at least (laughs). We worked with Jacob Hansen (Volbeat, Pretty Maids) for the first time in Denmark on the mix, which was different because the last two albums were mixed with a long time friend of the band, Achim Köhler. He's been involved with Primal Fear in some way since the very first album, actually. But this time we wanted to do things differently. We've been talking with Jacob for quite some time now about working together, and the time was right. We worked really hard with Jacob on the drum sound, then went to the guitars and vocals, and he really understands our music."

 

Primal Fear really started because Ralf was thinking about quitting the music business. At the same time he had an offer from a record company in Japan to make a solo album or deliver a band, and that's when we convinced him to write some songs with us. We got Ralf back behind the microphone, recorded a four song demo and sent it to Japan. The frustration he was feeling at that point had to do with the JUDAS PRIEST thing, but he felt good about writing those songs and getting the offer from Japan. And at that point we had 20 different band names on paper to choose from (laughs). The first album was just putting some great musicians together to see what would come out of it. Nobody ever thought we'd become a metal band that's respected worldwide from that album, but it happened and 15 years later our skills are at a much higher level. It was a real pleasure to write, record and mix Delivering The Black."

Read more at Bravewords.com.

BravePicks 2014 Top 30

22) PRIMAL FEAR – Delivering The Black (Frontiers)

23) DEVILMENT – The Great And Secret Show (Nuclear Blast)

24) MR. BIG - ...The Stories We Could Tell (Frontiers)

25) EYEHATEGOD – Eyehategod (Housecore)

26) STEEL PANTHER – All You Can Eat (Open E)

27) CALIFORNIA BREED – California Breed (Frontiers)

28) TESLA – Simplicity (Tesla Electric Co.)

29) PRONG – Ruining Lives (SPV/Steamhammer)

30) GAMMA RAY – Empire Of The Undead (EarMusic)