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This was a big surprise, because I had never heard of this band and they looked pretty damned silly, so I expected this to be annoying or weak or both, but instead this is one of the most flat-out entertaining albums I have ever heard.

Battle Beast play a kinetic style of pure Heavy Metal with a heavy dose of 80's cheese poured over it. The riffs are unadulterated old-fashioned workouts that strut and pout with no shame whatsoever, the keyboards are unabashed and loud, and the shout-out choruses are like metal joy distilled down to its essence. The band plays loud and hard and proud while vocalist Nitte Valo belts out her lines with wailing enthusiasm. These days there are so many bands who want to be taken seriously and seem kind of ashamed to be metal - Battle Beast are not like that at all. There is nothing deep or introspective about this music, it just rocks mightily. This album is pretty evenly split between solid rockers like "Enter the Metal World", "Band of the Hawk", and "Show Me How to Die" and uttely balls-out metal masterworks like the careening "Justice and Metal", "Cyberspace", "Die Hard Warrior", or the crunching ownage of "Iron Hand". There is simply not a bad song to be found on here, and every tune has propulsive riffs and vocal hooks like few bands dream of.

This is like the album Crystal Viper should have made after their debut – hard, heavy, and fearless. Battle Beast are not breaking the mold, not pushing any boundaries – they are just here to rock the fuck out and show you a fucking good time. When you boil it all down, metal is about kicking ass, and that's what Steel is all about. Do not miss this.