Band:	Grave Digger
Album:	Tunes Of War
Style:	Heavy metal
Release date:	August 25, 1996
A review by:	Pierre Tombale

01. The Brave
02. Scotland United
03. The Dark Of The Sun
04. William Wallace (Braveheart)
05. The Bruce (The Lion King)
06. The Battle Of Flodden
07. The Ballad Of Mary (Queen Of Scots)
08. The Truth
09. Cry For Freedom (James The VI)
10. Killing Time
11. Rebellion (The Clans Are Marching)
12. Culledon Muir
13. The Fall Of The Brave
14. Heavy Metal Breakdown [Re-Recorded version] [Limited edition bonus]
15. Witchhunter [Re-Recorded version] [Limited edition bonus]
16. Headbanging Man [Re-Recorded version] [Limited edition bonus]

This album is the first production of the later called ?The Middle Ages Trilogy?, a set of three digipacks, each containing several bonus tracks, three concept albums each dealing with a different topic. Thematically Tunes Of War is all about scottish history and the scottish efforts to stay sovereign from England.

This first concept album features two of the bands? standards: ?The Dark Of The Sun? which was later released as single, live classics such as ?Scotland United? and something which Grave Digger were never famous for: a good ballad (?The Ballad Of Mary?).
Introduced with bagpipes on ?The Brave?, the listener soon gets set in the mood for a piece of scottish history banned on a fine piece of metal. As mentioned there ale classics such as William Wallace (yeah it's Braveheart) and Rebellion, two of my favorite GD songs.
Unique as far as I know: The historical events are embedded as small texts within the booklet in german language, explaining what topics the songs are about. The historic outlook (of course only short episodes) begins in the 7th century and ends 1746 with the battle of ?Culloden Muir? where finally the scots were defeated and the rebellion ended. Afterwards no serious resistance against the english reign had appeared.

To explain the rating of 7.5, I like the whole album, but there are so many GD albums that are even better. There is no real weak song on T. O. W. and I like the idea of a shortcut on history but as I said I like others even better, i.e. the following out of the Middle Ages Trilogy out of which Tunes Of War is the ?worst?, so there has to be at least a kind of climax left for the other albums.

Reviewd By Iron Markus