Review | David Reece – Baptized By Fire

El Puerto Records

The year 2023 was a low-key year for the in Italy residing singer David Reece. He reconnected with Bangalore Choir and he was part of Iron Allies, an all-star metal band with the guitarists Herman Frank and Mike Pesin, drummer Francesco Jovino and bass player Malte Frederik Burkert. Their album ‘Blood In Blood Out’ was one of the metal highlights of the year 2022 with the band doing some gigs in 2023. Reece used the year to start working with a new all-Italian outfit consisting of guitarist Niccolo Savinelli, bass player Riccardo Demarosi and drummer Giovanni Savinelli, fabricating a new album under his own banner David Reece

CHANGES

For his last two solo-albums ‘Cacophony Of Souls’ and ‘Blacklist Utopia’ David worked together with producer/composer/guitarist Andy Susemihl while also mister Burkert made steady appearances on those albums. But this time David opted for some changes, working with a fresh squad in the hope of maybe finding some new musical inspiration and sounds. After hearing the twelve songs on ‘Baptized By Fire’ plenty of times I think not much has changed at all. David Reece opted to stay true to his metal colours with riff orientated heavy metal songs with melody and crunch. ‘Baptized by Fire’ surely rocks very hard indeed and is fairly consistent when you look at the song quality. Still, I have not heard anything I have not heard before on previous albums such as ‘Resilient Heart’ and the above-mentioned titles.

BAPTIZED BY FIRE – THE CONCLUSION

It is a quite simple conclusion. If you are into the three above mentioned records I am sure that tracks such as the title song, ,,Enemy Is Me’’, ,,Payback’s A Bitch’’ (with a killer riff!) or ,,Acceptance Of Denial’’ will please you as the power and force of Reece and his band is at times quite overwhelming. This record does not impress me as much as ‘Blood In Blood Out’ of Iron Allies did, but ‘Baptized By Fire’ can stand in the shadow of its three older brothers and has enough quality to stand tall on his own feet as well. Nothing new or surprising but efficient and tough as nails. And as always David Reece has kept it metal!

Release date: 1 March 2024