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Nightshadow is a power metal band out of San Diego that has been banging around since 2012 and has now released their debut album, Strike Them Dead, in 2021. They do not play crunchy, European power metal or strictly neoclassical ("flower") power metal, but have a sharp edge and loads of speed that make me think of Dragonforce. There's a dark vibe to many of the songs which gives them a slight thrash feel, but the solos are acrobatic displays up and down the fret board a la Totman and Li. The vocals are the sticking point as the singer is putting his all into his performance, but his voice isn't quite up to the material. He sounds like he's fighting what he's supposed to be singing on occasion and doesn't always win. The songwriting is also generic, memorable more for repetition ("Strike Them Dead") than any hooks. Strike Them Dead isn't terrible by any stretch, but it doesn't have enough positives to outweigh the negatives and I found it an album that became tougher to sit through each time I played it.