In this day and age, the need for nomenclature of different types of music has become more apparent as more distinct genres have emerged. And so it emerges, a brave new genre of Metal music. A new music that even Bill and Ted would have been proud of.

Power Metal combines extreme bass drumming with ultra fast melodic fret board shredding solos, and clear soaring vocals. As well as the unique musical sound, Power Metals lyrical content traditionally includes Arcane or Medieval themes. In short it's Heavy Metal on speed. Many of today's premiere power metal bands take inspiration from NWOBHM, including Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, Saxon, etc...

Pioneering the way forward, are bands such as Helloween, Blind Guardian and DragonForce. And often some new less heard of bands such as HammerFall and Heavenly. The list goes on, and is ever expanding. If you want my personal recommendation – I would buy Heavenly's new(ish) album, 'Dust to Dust'

Power Metal has been around since the mid 80's and despite having an entire decade and countless bands and quality albums; Power Metal is still very much an underground genre. Suffice to say though, if you're into Heavy Metal, are looking for something with a bit more grunt, but can't stand Death/Black vocals – Power Metal is for you.

You should be aware that an album that wants to be classed as a Power Metal album needs to have a Power Ballad on it. Although a slow ballad isnt "Power Metal" as such, it does have to be there in order for the album to be Power Metal. Don't ask me why, it just does.

Power Metal<\p>

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Power Metal is a subclass of heavy metal.
First there was only Heavy Metal, out of which Power metal evolved, along with many other Metal genres(such as: Death Metal, Black metal, Epic Metal, symphonic Metal).<\p>

Power Metal... What is it?<\big>

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Power Metal is easily recognized by the guitar solos and the fantasy lyrics. Almost after every paragraph of singing, a guitar solo follows, sometimes taking several minutes of the song.
You might start to think it quite lame, just guitar solos and people screaming on the background. But Power Metal is much more than just solos and screaming.
The lyrics are what make good Power Metal. The guitar solos must be original and there must be a slight variation in it every time.<\p>

If they sing, their voices must be filled with passion. By which I mean that when they sing, for example about death, you must be able to feel the hurt and the pain surging through them.<\p>

It is the same when they sing about a battle: Their voices must make you feel fearless, they must enable you to see the what is going on in the song as clearly as if you were in that particular scene.<\p>

And finally the lyrics: The lyrics of Power Metal are one the key things that make Power Metal differ from other Metal genres. A common subject in Power Metal is battle. Battle, warfare and fantasy subjects are most commonly sung about.<\p>

A particularly famous song by Iron Maiden,for example, called "The Trooper," describes A cavalry charge. More than four minutes describing the glory of charging an enemy while on horseback.<\p>

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Power metal! Divided in two classes!<\p>

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There are two "classes" of Power Metal. We have European Power metal (also known as Scandinavian Power Metal), and we have a genre called American Power Metal. European Power Metal, with bands such as: Hammerfall, Sonata Arctica and ElvenKing, differs from American Power Metal(bands such as: Iced Earth, Dream Evil, Mystic Prophecy)on everything except the lyrics, which remain based on fantasy subjects.
European Power Metal uses High Electrical guitar solos while American Power Metal doesn't go half as high. American Power Metal singers don't go round screaming in high voices either but have more controlled voices, which sound a bit more like the original Heavy Metal voices.<\p>

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Power Metal! Hail Satan?? We bring death and destruction???<\p>

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For those of you who are not familiar with Metal Music I shall explain that the above is not the case for Power Metal. Of course there is such a thing as satanic metal in which the vocalists praise and worship Satan. But that is TOTALLY different from Power Metal.It is in fact an entirely different genre of Metal. So we also have Metal genres such as: Death Metal, gothic metal, Black Metal, . And even genres such as: Pink Metal and Love Metal(The only band currently playing Love Metal, is the band called HIM, who also invented it).
As far as I know only Symphonic metal and Epic metal show any similarity to Power metal. Power Metal is therefore often comibined with Symphonic Metal to create some sort of balance between the two of them.<\p>

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Some Popular Power Metal Bands!<\p>

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Hammerfall
Stratovarius
Blind Guardian
Iced Earth
Helloween<\p>

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"The Brothers Of Metal will always be there, standing together with hands in the air !"quote by Manowar "Brothers Of Metal"