Praise Priestess

America hates Priestess. The fact is almost indisputable at this point. The Montreal throwback metal quartet’s earthshaking debut “Hello Master” spent a year on Canadian shelves before any American label thought to release it, even while the band toured with heavy metal it-boys Mastodon. Now the follow-up record “Prior to the Fire” is finally being released stateside nearly two years after its completion and six months after its Canadian release.

Priestess seems unaffected by any disrespect the music business harbors. The new LP is everything retro rock should be: mountain-moving riffs, fuzzed-out solos, strong vocals and an impeccably Zeppelin-esque sense of songwriting. The opening one-two punch of “Lady Killer” and “Raccoon Eyes” sets the bar impossibly high, until “The Firebird” blows both out of the water.

The band might have appeared in “Guitar Hero III” a few years back, but the musicians are anything but the next DragonForce. This is real, gritty rock music, with enough staying power to outlast lesser retro rock bands like The Sword and Wolfmother, and they’ll keep doing it whether America is on board or not.