16. Wolf - Sophie Lancaster Stage - Friday, August 9th 2024

I love Wolf because they are European metal incarnate. They have been doing this for coming up to 30 years and they have never compromised and never changed. Fads have come and fads have gone but Wolf’s commitment to pure heavy metal has never changed. They sound the same now as they did in 1995 and they are wonderful because of that consistency.

This is heavy power metal. It shares some of the flamboyance of normal power metal but has much more oomph and muscularity. Wolf cultivate big tracks with anthemic choruses and pounding riffs. It is unashamedly metal, unashamedly old school and unashamedly wonderful. It bypasses all that messing around with pointless subgenres and just gives us what we want, what we need, namely tracks we can yell along to and guitar lines that we can air-guitar your heart out at. This is metal without pretension and if you need to be reminded just how vital pure unadulterated heavy metal can feel, you need to be in the Sophie tent to catch these guys. Don't say I didn't warn you.