- Country: Sweden
- Style: Melodic death metal
- Label: Century Media
- Release date: 8 September 2017
Jeff Loomis finally gets a full album with Arch Enemy, and you can hear it in the solos. On “The Race” and “First Day in Hell” the lead breaks have a slippery, slightly unhinged quality that sits nicely against Michael Amott’s more lyrical, melodic style. The riffs are still very much Amott’s, though, and Will to Power is a clean, glossy, arena-sized record that he and drummer Daniel Erlandsson produced themselves.
Alissa White-Gluz is in ferocious form on “The World Is Yours”, a fist-pumping single that does exactly what it’s built for, and “The Eagle Flies Alone” has a chorus that would make Iron Maiden nod along. The surprise is “Reason to Believe”, a slow-burner where she spends long stretches singing cleanly. It won’t convert everyone, and it slows the momentum, but it’s a braver move than another by-the-numbers mid-tempo track. The real downside is length: a couple of songs in the back half blur together, and the formula is showing some wear. When it hits, though, as on “Saturnine” and the closer “A Fight I Must Win”, it hits hard.
Best tracks:
The World Is Yours
The Eagle Flies Alone
First Day in Hell
The Race
A Fight I Must Win
Author’s rating: 7.9/10
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