Band:	Axel Rudi Pell
Album:	Game Of Sins
Style:	Heavy metal, Power metal
Release date:	January 2016

01. Lenta Fortuna (intro)
02. Fire
03. Sons In The Night
04. Game Of Sins
05. Falling Star
06. Lost In Love
07. The King Of Fools
08. Till The World Says Goodbye
09. Breaking The Rules
10. Forever Free
11. All Along The Watchtower [digipack bonus] [Bob Dylan cover]

To me, Axel Rudi Pell epitomizes generic power metal: trite and nonspecific lyrical content, pleasant (if commonplace) operatic vocals, and songs raised by the Euro-flower hegemony but born of hard rock and the synth-laced pop music of generations past. Game Of Sins does nothing to ameliorate my image of the band, but neither does it contain anything worthy of heavy disparagement.

Typically, Axel Rudi Pell retreads the same ground as countless other bands and stays isolated in a safe, middle-of-the-road power metal bubble. Although that's how I feel about a lot of Axel's material, that's really the worst I can say about the band; ARP never insults the listener's intelligence, and I don't even begrudge the group its longevity or productivity. ARP still makes enjoyable, inoffensive music, even if that music has to be enjoyed in spite of how quotidian it is. I didn't have a lot of patience for Into The Storm, whereas I find Game Of Sins more palatable, but it's difficult to find serious fault in any of these albums, and Axel has produced some real, quality material over the years in addition.

The eternally dulcet tones of Johnny Gioeli's voice soothe the soul; I doubt I could pick his voice out of a police line-up, but Gioeli still plays an important role in selling Axel's material. As for Axel himself, even if I don't personally find him as provocative or compelling a guitarist as others, he still possesses a lot of skill to show off.

"Fire" makes a moderately convincing play at being memorable; the song might be pedestrian at the end of the day, but it's upbeat, it's fun, and it attains more personality with each listen, which is kind of the opposite of what I had anticipated. "The King Of Fools" is pretty easy on the ears, as well, although? then again, so is Game Of Sins in its entirety. ARP also interprets "All Along The Watchtower" in a pretty fun and appropriate way, even if the intro sounds more like a dramatic, somber hymn sung over a battlefield than anything that really ought to be on an album generally lacking in depth.

I will say that none of these songs really needs to be over five minutes, and making some tracks even or eight minutes definitely pushes Axel's luck, but "Forever Free," Brobdingnagian though it is, sends off the album on a fairly positive note, just a hair better than most of the preceding 50 minutes. The song leaves a mellow, mildly pleasant aftertaste that reflects the overall mood of the work very well. There's no escaping the fact that Game Of Sins is basically the definition of average, but you could do a lot worse than to kick back and throw on this album.