kiuas lustdriven

Released: 05 April 2010 Label: Spinefarm

Every so often an album comes along that it’s difficult to really describe and, for me, Lustdriven is one of those. You see while Kiuas are most definitely a power metal band they’re a completely different beast to the likes of HammerFall, Gamma Ray, Stratovarius et al and the thicker guitar tones and more aggressive nature of their music bear more comparison to ‘extreme power metal’ bands like Children Of Bodom or Kalmah – albeit with entirely ‘clean’ vocals.

So what makes them so difficult to describe? Well, largely that despite doing everything I normally like in a metal band (melodic but not at the expense of strong riffs, memorable guitar hooks and a sense of power in their delivery) there’s just something missing here and I can’t quite put my finger on what it is. The opening Kiuassault is a storming heavy metal song that will surely get hair flying whenever they play live and there’s no shortage of big riffs and chest beating singalongs throughout the rest of Lustdriven and yet I always seem to find my attention wandering somewhere around the middle of the album and it only gets grabbed back sporadically.

Don’t get me wrong, this is by no means a bad album, there’s some pretty good songs on here, it’s well played, well produced and it’s actually quite pleasant to listen to – while it’s on, it’s just that no matter how many times I listen to Lustdriven it never quite ‘clicks’ with me and I can never remember how the songs go after they've finished. In a way it’s like one of those “Sunday afternoon” films that you can happily waste away an afternoon watching... but that you’d never particularly recommend to anyone else. Sorry Kiuas, this is a decent enough effort but “decent” just doesn’t cut it anymore.

by Neil Woodfin