ACCEPT

"Teutonic Titans 1976-2026" is a fairly novel idea from ACCEPT. They've rounded up 19 songs from their storied career (no "Midnight Mover"?) re-recorded them and brought along over a dozen guest performers. A long glance at the list of musicians and it's easy to reckon that this may be the most star-studded collection of (metal) guests in one place. Plus, the ACCEPT catalog is deep, especially from "Breaker" (1981) through "Russian Roulette" (1986),where a good chunk of these cuts come from. What a way for Wolf Hoffmann and crew to celebrate 50 years of metal, eh?

"Fast As A Shark" was a given to open the proceedings. Featuring Phil Anselmo (PANTERA / DOWN) on a few of the verses, Kirk Hammett (METALLICA) tossing in a solo, Billy Sheehan (MR. BIG) on bass and Mikkey Dee (ex-MOTÖRHEAD / KING DIAMOND) on drums, the refreshed "Fast As A Shark" is pummeling. The original, of course, is a game changer. JUDAS PRIEST's Rob Halford hops on "Balls To The Wall" with SCORPIONS' Matthias Jabs (guitar) and PANTERA's Rex Brown on bass. For a song that is ACCEPT's biggest, it's fun to hear an animated Halford work through Udo Dirkschneider's original vocal lines.

Current lead singer Mark Tornillo is, of course, doing a good chunk of the work here, taking the edgier choruses ("Run If You Can") and dueting with the best of the best, like BLIND GUARDIAN's Hansi Kürsch on "Losers And Winners" (the lines of "You'll feel better (write a letter)" are still fantastic) and ARMORED SAINT's John Bush on "Up to the Limit". Tornillo's output with ACCEPT has been mostly strong, but there's no questioning how well he handles Dirkschneider's parts.

GHOST's Tobias Forge handles all of the vocals on "Save Us", an otherwise forgettable song on the mostly excellent "Restless And Wild". Even Billy Corgan of the non-metal SMASHING PUMPKINS gets a spot on "Love Child". It's clearly not in Corgan's wheelhouse, although his vocal layering in the chorus is serviceable. And kudos to ACCEPT for including the "next generation" of metal vocalists in Dino Jelusick ("Metal Heart") and Girish Pradhan ("Breaker"),both of whom give hope for the future.

Plenty of fun seems to be had with "London Leatherboys" between Tornillo and ex-SKID ROW frontman Sebastian Bach, who adds a joyous flair to the song. The same applies to another New Jerseyite, OVERKILL's Bobby "Blitz" Ellsworth, who lends his cackle to "Demons Night". The set finishes strong with "Monsterman", notably because of Jeff Scott Soto and a blazing solo from NEVERMORE's Jeff Loomis, while "Restless And Wild" gets FOZZY's Chris Jericho and ex-JUDAS PRIEST axe-slinger K.K. Downing, making one of the few times he and Halford appear on the same record.

Hard to fathom all of the work that went into securing all of these guest spots — ACCEPT's management was probably burning up the phone lines like nobody's business. It was all worth it. "Teutonic Titans 1976-2026" is staggeringly deep, which drives home the point that ACCEPT wouldn't be in the metal business for 50 years if they weren't any good.