Bulgarian metal has finally arrived in the form of RAMPART. Voice Of The Wilderness is the bands first official release after having formed only three years ago. As I began listening to the CD I neglected to look at the picture of RAMPART until after the first couple songs. Noticing a beautiful woman with Rapunzel like hair in the band I began to wonder if she was the bass player. Upon viewing the liner notes it was only then that I realized she was the vocalist. Her name is Maria Doychinova and she had me fooled that is for sure. No she doesn’t do death metal growls or black metal screams. She sings traditional style heavy metal in the vein of Helloween and Running Wild and she does it very well. Her tone is rather low and unusual and most of the time you can hear her accent bleeding through. This alone sets RAMPART in a league all their own. For the majority of Voice Of The Wilderness, RAMPART’s music features fast thrashing beats, a head bangers delight. However, there is a very mellow track entitled Age Of Steel which features stringed instruments like violins and cellos, and is one of the best songs on the album. Most of these songs sound like throw backs to 1980s metal, the whole formula is there. You know the time, when the guitars stood forefront before anything else. Guitarist Yavor is the main composer and it shows. Sometimes I do find the music a little generic in places on this album. However there is hope and RAMPART wants to do their part in bringing back the real metal of decades past.