ACCEPT

Next year, the German giants of Accept will blow out no less than fifty candles on their metal cake. This band (founded in 1976) belongs together with Saxon, Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, Motörhead, Anvil, Diamond Head, Raven, and – okay then, Def Leppard – to the very first generation of heavy metal pioneers who provided the musical blueprint for countless bands after them. Accept’s most recent (seventeenth) studio album ‘Humanoid’ shows that the band has lost nothing in melody, energy and aggression. On the contrary: album tracks such as ‘Diving Into Sin’, ‘The Reckoning’, ‘Frankenstein’ and the title track can easily compete with Accept’s classics such as ‘Balls To The Wall’, ‘Princess Of The Dawn’, ‘Life’s A Bitch’, and the sharky Motörhead-on-speed-banger ‘Fast As A Shark’. Ficke, jawohl!