Sabaton – World War Live – Battle of the Baltic Sea (2011)

Sabaton has to be one of Power Metal most popular and exciting bands of these days. After the crushing release of “Coat of Arms” one year ago, the band gives us an excellent double live CD from their latest tour. In the CD we got from Nuclear Blast, we have 15 tracks showcasing the live power of Sabaton and delivering almost 80 minutes of their epic War-inspired Power Metal.

Shortly after a momentum gaining intro, “Ghost Division” sneaks up on you like a punch to the kidneys. Here you can listen to Joakim Bróden’s pipes ripping through the song just like it was recorded on the album. The epic chorus sections are here and the pounding guitars sound like a million dollars. The epicness continues with tracks like “Uprising”, “Aces in Exile”, and by the time we get to “Cliffs of Gallipoli” we are all-out head banging in our review room.

The band’s epic sound transfers perfectly to the live setting and when you get the crowd cheering as a background sound in this release it make your heart start racing. Our favorite track of this release has to be the rendition of “Wolfpack” and its riffing power courtesy of Rikard Sundén and Oskar Montelius. With everything perfectly well mixed, the band takes advantage of all their impressive hits and makes them sound almost like on their studio CD’s, truly amazing.

We have a huge pet peeve of preferring bands to sound as close to the CD as possible on their live appearances, and with this live CD we are stocked about one day getting to watch Sabaton live. On the downside, the Joakim’s interaction is not in English and we can’t really get into the groove of things like that, but this is a minor issue we have with an otherwise amazing release.

If you like Sabaton’s studio albums, you will LOVE this live release since it shows you how powerful the band still sounds on their shows. Comprised of their greatest hits from their five full-length releases any fan of the band or Power Metal in general, can’t afford to miss this massive release.

Release: September 13th, 2011

Country: Sweden