Sacred Gate – Creators of the Downfall

“Creators of the Downfall” is the debut EP by unsigned German heavy-power metal band Sacred Gate. What’s that you say? German metal? You have my interest. Three things Germany exports that I hold in high esteem are: beer, cars…and heavy metal. Give me a Warsteiner, a BMW (please) and some Blind Guardian or Running Wild and I’ll be happy. Sacred Gate has a heavy metal legacy to live up to, can they do it?

Hell yeah they can.

“Creators of the Downfall” has six songs, three studio and three live. By the end of the first song, not even the end really, I was a fan. So I’m pretty sad that I’m only getting a small taste now. I’ll have to wait until next year for more, when the full-length “When Eternity Ends” is released.

Other than the fact that they are also metal, Sacred Gate bears little resemblance to the bands mentioned above. There really aren’t any bands that jump immediately to mind when I try to think of something similar to the sound on this EP. Their bio sheet mentions that they want to show that traditional heavy metal is timeless. Listening to these songs I have to agree. You can say that this style is instantly dated to the 80s, but plenty of bands still play in this style now, so really this could have been recorded in the 80s, the 2010s or anywhere in between.

I like power metal, but some bands in that genre are a little over the top with the melodic vocals and flashy style. There are plenty of great power metal bands, but in some cases the singer sounds like they picked them up from a Journey cover band and the guy looks like a French poodle in costume from the set of The Three Musketeers or something. It’s just too much.

Sacred Gate is not that kind of band. The music is traditional heavy metal. The vocals of Jim Over are melodic, but they stand well on their own, they aren’t accompanied by masses of soaring backup vocals that detract from a metal song in my opinion. I’m straining my brain trying to think of a singer I can compare to Jim Over. Maybe a little bit like White Wizzard but not quite so high pitched?

It doesn’t really matter who or what they may or may not sound like. This is some really cool heavy metal and that is all you need to know. The EP is not widely available at this time, but you can check them out on their MySpace page to hear what they sound like. I hope Sacred Gate will hook me up with “When Eternity Ends” when it is released. I’ll be looking forward to hearing more.