Keeper of the Seven Keys, Vol. 2 (Expanded Version)

Album Review

Can you get a more bombastic opening than "Invitation" on Helloween's Keeper of the Seven Keys, Pt. 2 (in which victorious horns and marching drums signal Helloween's triumphant return)? Probably not, but that's exactly how the German metalists start off the follow-up to their cult hit predecessor, Keeper of the Seven Keys, Pt. 1. Having caught the ears of prog metalists worldwide with Pt. 1 (which was praised in such metal publications as Kerrang! at the time), Helloween wasted little time issuing a follow-up. And once more, the same exact brand of material is offered — Bruce Dickinson-esque operatic vocal wailing (see how singer Michael Kiske ends "Eagle Fly Free"), plenty of guitar shredding ("You Always Walk Alone"), and, of course, the obligatory epic ("Keeper of the Seven Keys"). While it may not have caused quite as big a buzz in the metal underground as Pt. 1 did, Keeper of the Seven Keys, Pt. 2 completed a trilogy of prog metal masterworks that were all issued in 1988 — Queensrÿche's Operation: Mindcrime and Iron Maiden's Seventh Son of a Seventh Son. [In 2006, the album was reissued as a double-disc remastered version via Sanctuary Records, in which several B-sides and remixes from this era were included.]