Band: Devildriver
Album title: Pray For Villains
Label: Roadrunner Records
Distributor: Roadrunner Records – Concreteweb Promotion Office - CNR.
Release date: 29/06/2009
Release: CD

We all know Devildriver (whose name refers to bells Italian witches used to drive evil forces away) from hit singles like “Hold back the day” or “Clouds over California”.
This time, the band from Santa Barbara California is about to unleash its latest album Called Pray For Villains.
And this is a totally different album then you’d expect from Devildriver, normally the band made songs that begin building up a certain tension and then releasing the madness at it’s height.
But this time the madness begins almost instantly with killer metal riffs on the opening track (Pray for Villains).
Luckily for the older fans of the band, there are groove and melodic elements (e.g. “Back with A vengeance” & “I’ve Been Sober”) like on the previous albums.
By hearing the songs, you feel a kind of positive energy rushing tough them. You can feel that they worked very hard on this cd and with this one coming out they really earned their spot among the great.
This is why they are nominated “best live band” for the Golden Gods Awards
The only downside for me about the album is that sometimes their sound seems a bit to industrial.

93/100

Jeroen.