The Metal Files

Pure Sweet Hell features Van Williams (ex-Nevermore), Dean Sternberg (Onward, ex-Into Eternity, WithinAnother, Toby Knapp) on vocals and Chris Eichhorn on guitar/bass.

This album is pretty damned good, especially Van’s drumming.  I know that should go without saying as he’s such an incredible player and personally I feel he’s severely underrated in the drumming community.  This album is heavy, and that’s a good thing.  There are some good technical spots here and there and this is pretty much just up in your face.  Dean’s clean vocals on here are killer, albeit a bit over-layered in this writer’s opinion.  In general this album is quite enjoyable except for Dean’s more “brutal”-esque vocals.  I’ve just gotten to a point where that singing style just doesn’t do it for me anymore.

There needs to be a renaissance of clean vocal metal again!

This album gets 8/10 though, as the music and clean vocals sound great.  I’d go see them live.