As the divisions that separate different music styles topple and genres fuse like never before, it’s heartening that there are still bands like Wolf who stay true to the ethos of heavy metal. Formed in 1995 when metal was at a commercial ebb, Wolf have swum against the tide and have been impervious to fads and trends, keeping the faith whilst many of their peers have jumped ship. It means that Wolf have left an impeccable trail of albums that are timeless (you won’t find any embarrassing secrets in their discography) and lead us to their tenth long player, Hour Of The Wolf, a record that stands as one of the band’s best.
Whilst Wolf have never strayed too far from metal’s core that doesn’t mean they are generic, far from it. As a genre, heavy metal offers its propagators a wide palette from which to draw upon; from soft pastel shades through bold splashes of colour, there’s a whole world waiting to be explored and Wolf have covered a lot of territory in their three decade history. It means that each of their albums has a unique aesthetic and a loose concept stitching it together. It’s undeniably true that you can’t judge a book by its cover (nor an album by its sleeve), yet the blood red onee that houses Hour Of The Wolf is pretty indicative of the sound contained within. It’s angry, dangerous and leaping straight for your jugular, and that’s exactly what opening track (and, indeed, the whole album) ‘Death Satellite’ does. It’s obvious that time hasn’t dulled Wolf’s fangs, the band sounding lean, hungry and with a thirst for blood; a circular riff being very air guitar inducing whilst the rhythm section deliver a succession of beats that are guaranteed to get the follicles flying.
Wolf are no retro act, nor are they too concerned with nostalgia, yet Hour Of The Wolf feels like an old school album, the kind you can listen to in one sitting. After the one-two punch of opening couplet ‘Death Satellite’ and ‘The Music Of Erich Zann’ things shift down a gear for the moody, more measured ‘Walpurgis Night’, before things explode back into life with ’Streets Of Necropolis’. That’s exactly how an album should flow, the shifts in pace constantly mixing things up and ensuring that things never become stagnant. Likewise, the 45-minute running time harks back to the age of vinyl and cassettes, the band knowing exactly when to cut out and leave us hungry for more.
Bringing things full circle, ‘Dirty Little Secret’ is another high-octane rocker to bookend the album and concludes what could (arguably) be Wolf’s finest moment suggesting this could be the…Hour Of The Wolf.
- Hour Of The Wolf is released via Fireflash Records on 20th November 2026 (available here).
- Wolf Official Website
Track List:
- Death Satellite
- The Music Of Erich Zann
- Walpurgis Night
- Streets Of Necropolis
- Waltz Post-Mortem
- Hour Of The Wolf
- Above The Fallen
- Doppelgänger
- Dirty Little Secret
