★★★★★
Tweet Moderate Adequateload The United Kingdom's DragonForce have become somewhat emblematic of a power metal (sometimes speed metal) subculture that remains blissfully ignorant of all the bleakness, sorrow and morbidity that permeated heavy metal--and popular music in general--from the 1990s on. Instead, DragonForce keep rocking like hair metal never went out of style, like the NWOBHM (New Wave of British Heavy Metal) never crested and rolled back...
- www.mxdwn.com
2014-08-22
★★★★★
In a way, I've felt a little bad for Dragonforce in recent years. Sure, they should have to earn their status in the music world like any other band. But when the band were thrust into the spotlight with their 2006 tune "Through the Fire and Flames" and how it became synonymous with Guitar Hero, polarization within the metal community became the ultimate result...
- www.sputnikmusic.com
2014-08-21
★★★★★
Sound: Before I played guitar, I played "Guitar Hero" (you probably knew this was coming). Like many, I was introduced to DragonForce by the last song in the video game, "Through the Fire and Flames." Aside from being the game's most notorious song, on a personal level, it was the first time I heard shredding that did not sound like bees buzzing and the first time I heard fast metal that did not involve ugly growling...
- www.ultimate-guitar.com
2014-08-24
★★★★★
Six albums into their career, DragonForce should really be running out of steam. Yet Maximum Overload is as wickedly infectious as their high point from 2006, Inhuman Rampage, and more exciting and substantial than their two subsequent albums. There are more than enough anthemic choruses, startling detours and flashes of ingenuity lurking within the adrenalised bluster of The Game, Tomorrow's Kings and Symphony of the Night to counter the notion that the London-based crew are a one-trick...
- www.theguardian.com
2014-08-15
★★★★★
So many technical metal bands seem to forget that metal was originally prefaced by "heavy" and play music that is anything but. They get lost focusing on playing ability and it becomes more a vessel for showing off than a natural consequence of the songwriting. DragonForce were victims of this self-inflicted problem for much of their career, but the loss of vocalist ZP Theart mandated a switch in focus...
- exclaim.ca
2014-08-16
★★★★★
Basically, for Dragonforce the album title tells the tale, what lies within. So here's Maximum Overload, their sixth album of epic power metal. Call it what you will, pompous power metal, more bombastic and glorious speed metal hyperbole, but they're back. Buckle up dudes. It's going to be an intense fast ride. Dragonforce: maximum metalish. The acceleration begins at the start with The Game, Tomorrow's Kings, and No More being power metal versions of a Japanese bullet train...
- www.dangerdog.com
2014-08-02
★★★★★
"Sometimes I just need some high-voiced, frilly shirt fancy-boys to get all emotional and serenade me about sailing and sea monsters and quests and love and whatever else. This isn't it." Dragonforce has been around for one-and-one-half decades and "Maximum Overload" is the group's sixth proper full-length, yet saying anything meaningful about the band now is difficult as it really doesn't try to do anything new. But of course, that isn't the point...
- www.metalunderground.com
2014-07-26
★★★★★
Sound: This is the first DragonForce album to feature Marc Hudson as vocalist, who joined the band in early 2011. ZP Theart left in 2010 for creative differences according to online sources. Marc Hudson immediately shows that he is up to the task, however. There are 10 tracks on the album with an approximate run time of 50 minutes...
- www.ultimate-guitar.com
2012-04-19
★★★★★
Sound: DragonForce is one of the fastest, chaotic, cheesiest, awesomest (not a word but who cares) band that has ever happened to music. This CD is their 3rd and my favorite of the 3. It seems like every album gets better. Their singer is one of the best in the history of rock. Most new metal bands you'll hear these days the singer just screams (thus screamo). For one I cant stand it. So its a relief to hear a band be able to be this fast and not hear screaming over it...
- www.ultimate-guitar.com
2012-04-12