The Great Collection Rediscovery

Album: Land of the Free

Old Rating: 5/5

Verdict: Probably Gamma Ray's most famous album for good reason, being the point that the true Gamma Ray (that fronted by Kai Hansen) was born, likely back in 1995 something old school Helloween fans had waited a decade for. I'm personally perhaps a tad more partial to Somewhere Out in Space (but watch this space for its own entry in The Great Collection Rediscovery), but this is a very close second. Lots of great power metal songs here. As much as I like Helloween I am also a bit more partial to Gamma Ray of the two. 

New Rating: No Change. 

Album: Port Royal

Old Rating: 5/5

Verdict: Perhaps not the most technically accomplished Running Wild album, but I've a real soft spot for Port Royal that has kept it one of my favourite Running Wild albums, currently only second to Black Hand Inn, though it's possible that could change with these current re-listens - they certainly have several contenders to get bumped up to five stars.

New Rating: No Change. 

Album: Death or Glory

Old Rating: 4.5/5

Verdict: Sometimes singled out as Running Wild's best work, Death or Glory does certainly sound more polished compared to their usual rawer edges heavy/power metal material, but for me it just doesn't have the same amount of their best songs on it that certain other RW albums do, though it does still have its share.

New Rating: No Change.

Album: Blazon Stone

Old Rating: 4/5

Verdict: For me a very slight blip in an otherwise exceptional run of albums that lasted over a decade, Blazon Stone is still better than most of what they've put out since 2000 and is perhaps now better known as the Running Wild album that gave its name to a certain a band who are by all intents and purposes a copycat act yet sound stronger than Running Wild does these days, even on the quite solid Rapid Foray. Most fans would be content for modern Running Wild to be on Blazon Stone's (meaning this album, not the band) level, but instead its a lesser entry in their classic years, stuck in between the much more essential Death or Glory and Pile of Skulls. 

New Rating: No Change. 

Album: The Rivalry 

Old Rating: 4.5/5

Verdict: Okay so this is the only Running Wild album I own that will be taking a small rating hit, since it doesn't hold up to a 4.5 star for me now. Not enough of their best songs, just like Blazon Stone, for my money, but still some great choice cuts. Their last solid album until Rapid Foray's return to form. 

New Rating: 4/5

Album: Miklagard

Old Rating: 5/5

Verdict: An all time favourite album of mine. If it weren't for albums like Ayreon's The Theory of Everything and Beyond Twilight's For the Love of the Art and the Making with their high track counts this would be my fifth most played album on Last.fm. I've had it for ten years and its still lost nothing. 

New Rating: No Change (invisible 6/5)

Album: Somewhere Out in Space

Old Rating: 5/5

Verdict: Probably my favourite Gamma Ray album, although I do seem to have played Land of the Free more. I find it a really sad state of affairs for metal that this is just so damn hard to get in the UK, both when I got it and even more so now. Land of the Free had an anniversary reissue in 2017 (an odd 22 years after release) but Somewhere Out in Space has received no such treatment. Which kind of sucks for me, as I found on my relisten to this that the mp3 files ripped from it have some corruption, which hints as serious problems with the actual disc. An album I need to replace. Which doubly sucks because I have owned two copies of it before, and sold the other. 

New Rating: No Change.

Album: Eifur

Old Rating: 5/5

Verdict: My favourite Fejd album. It's a combo and then new songs and re-recordings from their early demos, which is actually the material I largely discovered the band with. Fejd eventually became a metal band on their fourth album, but on this one and other early releases they sit between Nordic folk music and folk rock and always fit in with the folk metal scene, no heavy guitars required. 

New Rating: No Change. 

Album: Power Plant

Old Rating: 4.5/5

Verdict: While I've never found Power Plant to be as strong or interesting as Land of the Free and Somewhere Out in Space, it does represent Gamma Ray still riding a strong wave of material and an important album for any power metal fan to have in its own right. 

New Rating: No Change. 

Album: Empyrean Realms

Old Rating: 5/5

Verdict: Playing catch up with this thread right now with several albums to write about. This one's a really great power metal album. I can't believe it came out in 2013 and they still haven't followed it up. I really love the spacey cover as well. 

New Rating: No Change.