2012's Force of Destruction is the only Paragon album I've reviewed for The Metal Crypt, but it was a high point of that year, so I was happy to see their 12th album, Controlled Demolition, drop into my review queue. Metal is what Paragon lives and breathes, so you can rest assured they are out to riff the shit out of you and there are some killer tracks on Controlled Demolition, starting with "Reborn", which after the instrumental title track, opens the album with a furious barrage of guitar fury. "Blackbell" has one of the meanest sounding riffs I've heard in a long while to go along with a simple but oh so memorable chorus. Come to think of it, "Black Widow" is in the same mold. That said, the overall tone is more accessible than some of this band's masterworks. Add the fact that vocalist Andreas Babuschkin sounds a lot like Udo Dirkschneider and Controlled Destruction comes across more like a U.D.O. album than, say, Law of the Blade. If you were hoping for a dark tour de force of Germanic metal, you might be a bit let down. On the other hand, this is still some high-quality crunchy power metal from a band that knows what they are doing. Not Paragon's best work but still worthy of the name.
