After staggering off four crazy days at sea for the 70000 Tons of Metal cruise, my ears and brain are fried unto merciless death. Luckily, I anticipated this contingency and left myself a fairly easy bounce-back to reality with the sophomore album from England’s classic metal rockers, Tailgunner. I was a fan of their 2023 Guns for Hire debut and found their modernized take on NWoBHM antics to be an entertaining ride. They slot into the same category as acts like Enforcer, Wolf, and Skullfist, and they have enough talent to sell traditional metal thrills like they’re something new. On Midnight Blitz, they rock a slightly more polished variant of what we heard last time with less of an obvious NWoBHM core, but their basic attack plan is still there. It’s all high-flying dual-guitar assaults, soaring vocals, and thundering drums, forced through an anthemic stadium-metal filter to create catchy, crunchy little metal nuggets ready to dip in shitty beer. It’s as cutting-edge and innovative as a stick, but sometimes brainless is better anyway. Now shut up and get in the gun seat!
Things open up effectively with the exuberant title track, which delivers all the classic metal goods and recalls Iron Maiden’s “Aces High” in subtle and unsubtle ways, especially in the lusty guitar noodling. The chorus is immediate and hooky and works as intended, and you will suffer involuntary fist-banging disorder as you prepare to strike at something at midnight. They manage to keep things in this winning window for much of the runtime with catchy tidbits like “Tears in the Rain,” which pays homage to the coolest lines from Blade Runner in appropriately big ways with a huge chorus, and the stupidly infectious “Dead Until Dark,” which rocks hard and rides free with a big Euro-power chorus that sticks like peanut butter mixed with Gorilla Glue. Some of the tracks punch above their weight and really win you over, like “Barren Lands and Seas of Red” and “Blood Sacrifice,” which thread that tiny needle between 80s metal and Euro-power to deliver hot guitar work and larger-than-life choruses.
Elsewhere, “Night Raids” reminds me of something off Human Fortress’s immortal Defenders of the Crown album, so that’s a win. Even the big, overwrought power ballad “War in Heaven” hits harder than you’d expect, sounding a bit like Primal Fear, though it does blunt the album’s momentum somewhat. Not every song is as clutch as the top dogs, and there is a minor bloat factor on a few songs, but no track feels like filler or an afterthought, and at 44 minutes, Midnight Blitz flies by like a gloaming onslaught. The production is a bit too clean, and I’d prefer more bite on the guitars, but you can hear everything the band does clearly.
Craig Carns leads the air attack for Tailgunner, and he sounds more polished and professional here than he did on Guns for Hire. He no longer reminds me of Blaze Baley or Brian Ross of Satan, and his clear, commanding vocals skew more to a Euro-power style now, but there’s still enough grit to get the job done well. Much of the impact comes from guitarists Zach Salvini and Rhea Thompson. They rob the vaults of 80s metal wantonly while dabbling in various levels of Euro-cheese making, but never go too far down that rabbit hole to find the pirate shirts. There are ripping riffs, melodic harmonies, and overblown solos aplenty, and they keep the energy levels sky high for much of the runtime.
Midnight Blitz is a successful evolution of the Tailgunner sound. I might prefer the slightly more raucous sound of their debut, but what these cats do is still in the wheelhouse of Steel, and I eat it up like fruit leather and old Twinkies. If you like high-energy 80s metal designed to get the head nodding, Tailgunner is the caliber of act you should load up and blast. Fun will be had, and planes will be felled. It’s it’s a Midnight Blitz!
Rating: 3.0/5.0
DR: NA | Format Reviewed: Fucking Stream
Label: Napalm
Websites: tailgunner.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/tailgunnerhq | instagram.com/tailgunnerhq
Releases Worldwide: February 6th, 2026
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