Raider - Trial by Chaos

Quantum Thrash

I wish I liked Raider so much more than I actually do.  I wanted to frontload this review with praise because basically every single component involved in Trial by Chaos is individually fantastic.  The riffs are razor sharp and superlative in both quantity and quality, the pace is breakneck on a level of classic releases by the most insane bands in the genre like Sodom, Sepultura, and Sadus, the vocals are primarily an unbelievably venomous snarl, the album is cohesively destructive, every single thing I like about thrash is present in abundance and the quality thereof is immense.

So why have I knocked back like eight straight listens of this album and still can't remember literally anything except the choruses in "New Dominion" and "Labyrinth"?  My instinct is to argue that they're the only two moments where the guitars let their foot off the gas and let the brutality wash over like a wave of sarin gas as opposed to forty bazooka shells per second, but I'm willing to bet I'd find more moments like that on subsequent listens.  Those moments of genuine hooks are likely there elsewhere but I'm still functionally reviewing blind despite spending literal hours with Trial by Chaos.  

This may be an odd comparison since there's an extremely high chance that the entire metal listening populace has completely forgotten about this band over the last decade, but the band this actually reminds me of most is Battlecross.  There was this period of time in the early tens when they were undergoing a pretty big push by Metal Blade and found themselves all over the bigger metal media outlets.  I heard them constantly during the three month window where I had satellite radio, they played Mayhem Fest, their second and third albums were pushed and championed really hard, I had no shortage of opportunities to hear them and soak in their absolutely vicious brand of thrash, injected with enough brutality to earn them the death/thrash moniker and enough melody to see them erroneously pegged as metalcore because 2012 was a very stupid time.  Their hallmark feature, however, was how wholly forgettable they were.  Every single song was the best fucking thing I'd ever heard and then within the course of a moderate-length toilet break I would forget they even existed.  They had this approach to thrash that consisted of throwing ten gazillion riffs at you in thirty minutes, all of which were good on their own, but when smashed together it just became a total blur of percussive noise that dissipated within seconds.  I know I've made this exact comparison for this exact reason in it least two or three other reviews and, hilariously, I can't remember which ones.  There are certainly more temporally relevant examples than Battlecross and yet I keep reaching back to them because they're the only example of this phenomenon whose name I've been able to remember.  I want to be pretentious and give it its own genre, "quantum thrash" or something along those lines.  Something that only exists during the exact moments I'm engaging with it.

That's the liminal space where Raider resides.  It's a huge shame because, and I can't state this enough, all of the components are there.  A few members are also in Cathartic Demise, a band with a similar style that I really enjoy, but it seems like scaling back the more overtly melodic moments of that band and giving them an in-your-face wall of sound production turns all of those excellent riffs into a faceless morass of intensity.  The moments that do stand out are all the brief moments where they break from this overwhelming and arduous aural assault.  Those octave patterns that hold while the drums and vocals pound away in "Labyrinth" stand out partially because they're the only notes on the entire god damned album longer than a quarter note, and because it gives the music some melodic subtlety while allowing the vocals to rip out one of the only actual hooks on the album.  It genuinely reminds me of Arsis at their best, that bit is straight out of "The Cold Resistance".  "Juggernaut Cerebrivore" stands out entirely for the first minute featuring haunting clean guitars that build to a sincerely explosive release.  It's one of the starkly few times the album the album isn't brickwalling you to death and the only moment that reminds me of a band whose entire appeal isn't all-intensity-all-the-time, that being Metallica in this case.  Every other moment edges much closer to the more ferocious acts from thrash's heyday like Demolition Hammer or Morbid Saint.  Those bands both rule, as does every other name I've dropped so far, but they all have actual hooks and memorable moments to complement their relentless savagery.  Raider has savagery in abundance with so few memorable moments that, without scrolling up to check, I seriously can't remember which two songs I highlighted in the second paragraph because I'm pretty sure "Juggernaut Cerebrivore" wasn't one of them.

Maybe this is a me problem.  I'm cognizant enough to recognize that I like all of the elements at play, and maybe this album simply isn't one that instantly hooks you and instead reveals its tricks over time.  As I get older, I find myself with less and less time to spend with albums that I need to "learn" to enjoy.  Maybe this makes me a dummy that requires instant gratification, maybe I just accidentally discovered why oldnoobs who only listen to bands they loved as teenagers and convince themselves that every new mediocre nothingburger is actually another masterpiece exist in the first place, maybe I'm just not in the right headspace for this kind of music right now and I would've reacted much differently if my first listen happened a month from now, who the fuck knows?  At the same time, I am the target audience for this, I do enjoy plenty of bands with a similar ethos, including bands that share members (Cathartic Demise) and inhabit the same scene (Invicta, Detherous), so there's something here that just isn't working.  Is it unfair to say an album is kinda mediocre and ultimately skippable despite enjoying all of the elements at play and not being able to explain why beyond vaguely gesturing at a memory hole?

Prolly.

RATING: 58%

Crush the Altar - Abhorrent Oblation

Solid, if nothing new

Well, now that my big projects are done, I suppose it's time I get back to what I've dedicated this year to doing so far: reviewing the neverending deluge of promos.  My first choice to jump back in was a band that wound up having multiple sexual assault allegations against the guitarist (enough for the label to drop them), so I figured fuck that I'm not gonna give that guy any press.  Then when researching my second choice I found out that motherfucker is in that band too.  So uhh... hey rapey guy?  Go away.

So fuck it, third choice, we're heading to the Garden State to revel in some decidedly rapeless brutality.  Crush the Altar's debut demo, Abhorrent Oblation, doesn't bring a whole lot of new ideas to the table, but they make up for their lack of creativity with some simplistic barbarity that's as effective as it is rancorous.  All three tracks here are reminiscent of early Pestilence, taking thrash riffs to their logical extreme and firmly planting one foot in the realm of death metal.  This blend of high speed thrash mania and mid-paced crushing morbidity is nothing new, but it's refreshing to hear somebody not try to outsmart the classics every once in a while.  Sometimes you've just gotta pay homage to the masters that came before you and pay tithe at the altar (before crushing it).  I've said before that originality isn't a necessity, and this is more evidence as to what I mean.  There are smatterings of Consuming Impulse, Altars of Madness, and Leprosy all over the place, and the adrenaline is kept consistently high.  There's also a really menacing mid-paced section halfway through "Demonizing the Ancient Lore" that I think was supposed to be super morbid and devastating but honestly just sounds like the bridge of "Master of Puppets" tuned down two steps, so that's kinda funny. 

Honestly there just isn't much to say here.  I always struggle with writing for short demos and this is no exception, but if you like any of the bands I've namedropped then you're sure to find something to like here.  This isn't going to set the world on fire, but these three guys definitely have talent and know what they're doing when it comes to evil death/thrash.  So if nothing else, I'll keep my eye on 'em in the future to see if they ever truly forge their own identity, because they're very good as an unoriginal utilitarian extreme metal band as it is.


RATING: 77%

Destroyers of All - The Vile Manifesto

Ruuuby ruuuuuby rubyruby soho

The riff at 2:45 in "False Idols" is the main riff from Blue Oyster Cult's "Godzilla"

I'll admit that I fell victim to "cover judging" here a bit, coming across a band tagged on MA as "Progressive Death/Groove Metal" with a logo by Christoph Spzizijaizjidel and cover art by Mark Riddick just screamed "riffless modern wank with all pomp and no substance", and I was pleasantly surprised to find out that that wasn't really true.  There's no doubt that this falls into the usual trappings of modern death/thrash by being consistently intense with less standout highlights than I would like, but the fact that I just referred to them as death/thrash instead of the visual eardrum-repellent of a genre tag previously stated should tell you that these Portuguese metalloids are about to make defying expectations something of the norm here.

Yeah, Destroyers of All adds a bit of everything to the pot, touching on death, black, thrash, prog, groove, and metalcore with a surprisingly deft touch.  I think the base of the music lands on the line between death and thrash metal most often, while the other bits are just window dressing that get center stage quite rarely, only taking hold in brief snippets here and there, but these dudes are pretty damn good at making it all sound natural so it never really comes off as jarring.  Take a track like "Destination: Unknown".  It opens on a thrash riff reminiscent of something like modern Testament, followed by  high speed blasts of Goatwhore-esque tremolo filled black/death intensity punctuated with staccato dissonance, broken up by a more overt whirlwind of a thrash riff that calls to mind one of the more technically frenetic legends like Destruction, which precedes a blazing solo that climaxes on a Metallica-cum-Lamb of God riff, before breaking into a vaguely Latin American inspired acoustic jaunt, and again pulling back around to the catchy death/thrash of a verse riff that I glossed over earlier.  It sounds like a total mess on paper, I'll admit, but it comes off so fucking naturally that I didn't even notice how wildly disparate each individual section truly is until the sixth or so listen. 

What this truly reminds me of is a more musically adventurous throwback to Deathchain's peak in the mid 2000s, or alternatively a more streamlined and catchy Satyrasis.  While there aren't too many songs I can immediately point to as obvious highlights, there are plenty of individual sections that completely rock my shit.  There's the gang vocal "HAIL TO THE EMPEROR" shout in "Tohu Wa-Bohu", the quiet middle eastern break that leads into a devastating chug riff on "The Elephant's Foot", the dexterous breakdown that opens "Sheol", the punk-infused venom of "Kill the Preacher", the immaculately infectious verses of "Destination: Unknown", there are a ton of moments to like.  The only real flaw of the album is that "Ashmedai" and "The Dead Valley" are just sorta inconsequential when compared to the whizbang pyrotechnics of the rest of the tracks.  Most of the best moments are found in the first few tracks, but I'd be doing the album a disservice if I implied that it got worse as it went on, because it really doesn't.  I think the anarchic lunacy just starts to wear on you a bit once you're approaching the 35th minute and being pummeled with your 600th riff, and hell if anything I see that as an endorsement of how fucking wild The Vile Manifesto is.

A fiery goulash of pretty much every extreme metal subgenre being thrown at you from twenty angles might be overwhelming to some, but as one of the writers behind The Outer RIM I think it'd be unsurprising to most people to find out that I don't care one iota about the frantic pulling of several genres, and even then it's rather palatable considering I've made more cohesive culinary references up to this point.  It's all very well blended into one continuously complementary flavor palette, as opposed to a trail mix effect where each bite could contain wholly different ingredients and taste wildly different depending on where you reach.  The base of death/thrash is strong enough to tie the room together.  Despite me mentioning the lack of true highlights when songs are taken as a whole, it's really kind of misleading because it's all presented as one continuous conga line of riffs and hooks, so the semi-arbitrary cutoffs regarding where each track begins and ends results in the whole album being a cyclone of entertainment.


RATING: 88%

QUICK HITS: Dreaming Dead - Funeral Twilight

It's like an unbuilt rollercoaster

Man I really want to like Dreaming Dead, but something about them just never seems to mesh correctly with me.  That's a partially unfair statement because prior to this album I was only familiar with their debut, but it was a total in-one-ear-and-out-the-other album and their long awaited return in 2017 with Funeral Twilight doesn't do much to convince me that I was unfair about them early on.  All of the elements for a badass record are here but nothing seems to coalesce into something genuinely riveting.  There are a lot of high octane melodic death/thrash riffs absolutely boiling over with venom, but nothing sticks.  It's sad because I don't really know what else to say about them.  It's certainly not for a lack of talent, since the band has a great ear for subtle melody and can make hyperspeed Kreator-style thrash riffs sound completely effortless to play, and Schall's rasp is one of the better Symbolic-era Schuldiner impressions out there, but it's all a blast of sound and fury that ultimately signifies nothing.  This is the problem with a lot of death/thrash in general, honestly.  You'll get behemoth exceptions like Deathchain and The Crown in their primes, but in general Funeral Twilight is indicative of the overwhelming serviceable mediocrity that plagues the genre.  There's nothing inherently wrong with these blistering riffs and frantic pace, but it's wholly lacking a sense of real danger to give it that extra oomph.  The hooks are few and far between, there's a startling dearth of memorable lines, and after several spins I still can't remember much of anything that happens.  "Beyond the Black Moon" has some cool bass tricks going on in the background and "Remnants of a Time Long Forgotten" is a neat change of pace with it's doomy instrumentals, but otherwise there isn't much else to point out.  Despite all the flash and frenzy, there just isn't anything exciting here.


RATING - 48%

Exmortus - Beyond the Fall of Time

#YGOD

SERIOUSLY?!  This album is... I dunno, it's a miracle.  I have no fucking clue how it managed to end up sucking as much as it does.  Really, if anybody remembers nearly five years ago, Exmortus's debut full length, In Hatred's Flame, landed a near perfect score from me.  It was such a delicious hodgepodge of over the top technicality and low brow catchiness.  It's was big, dumb, fast music for big, dumb, fast people like me, and I ate that shit up.  I've since gone back and revisited it, and you know what?  It's still fucking awesome.  Really, that debut pretty much perfectly showed what you could do by putting a new, modern spin on a few styles that were starting to get stale, and the songwriting was so stellar and the performance was so theatrical and bombastic, there wasn't a whole lot to complain about.  If you can go back and not rip shit apart to "Triumph By Fire" or "War Gods", you're dead inside.  Exmortus was seriously a defining band for me, a milestone in my life, and I rank the show where they headlined above Vektor and Diamond Plate in 2009 (before any of these bands sucked), three days before Christmas in the back room of a bar that resembled a subway tunnel as a top ten show for me, even if there was only like thirty people there.  The performances were all so exuberant and energetic, and none more so than Exmortus.  This was a band on fire, ready to destroy every goddamn thing in their path.

And then Beyond the Fall of Time happened.  I wish I could understand what the hell happened to everything during the time between the two records.  I'm not kidding when I say that not one aspect from the debut has been improved upon, and in fact they have all gotten worse.  The production and the vocals are the two most obvious, but the fiery leadwork and interesting songwriting are probably the two most important things to take a nosedive.  Really, apart from the intro to "Entombed with the Pharaohs" and the verse riff for "Black XIII", I don't see a whole lot to sneeze at.  The riffs aren't nearly as creative as they once were, and instead sound like a much less death metal influenced and much less intense version of Revocation as opposed to the passionate thrash/melodeath/Bodom style they used to exemplify.  I always rallied against them being lumped in with the whole rethrash scene along with Skeletonwitch and Vektor, but it's a bit harder to make that argument now.  A lot of the extraneous influences have been stripped away in favor of a more basic thrash sound this time around, and the songwriting suffers greatly as a result.  This is strange because I feel like Beyond the Fall of Time is meant to be a much more ambitious effort than its predecessor, what with there being three interlude tracks and four tracks over six minutes in length and all.  It's not often you see a band get less creative when it comes to tackling something with a bigger endgame in mind.  But yeah, it's mostly just a thrash album now, whereas before it'd be pretty misleading to simply refer to In Hatred's Flame as a thrash album.  It's pretty disappointing.

Every major problem with the album makes itself known within the first minute or so of "Kneel Before the Steel" (which the band has been trying hopelessly to turn into a catchphrase).  The production, instead of that full, beefy, and raw sound of the previous album has been replaced with a very plastic sounding botch-job.  What was once drenched in reverb and natural aggression hasn't been "cleaned up" as much as it's just been "fucked with".  Everything feels damp and muffled now, with the drums in particular sounding very wooden and dry.  The opening drum fills really make that apparent very early on, and the main riff just sounds really half hearted.  But when the vocals start... oh man what happened?  Despite seeing them live twice, I really do fail in the sense that I can't remember who handled a majority of the vocals, Conan or Balmore.  But seeing that Balmore has since left the band and Conan is the only one credited with vocals on this album shows that it must have been Balmore, because they sound completely different.  Instead of the deep roars of the past, we're presented with a much sillier sounding grunt most of the time, with these boundlessly stupid and ill-fitting falsettos thrown in occasionally.  This must be counted among the worst vocal shifts in metal history, because this new sound neither sounds good on its own, nor does it fit with the band's music in the first place.

If I have to give props anywhere, I can still at least say that while the leads and solos aren't as good as they could be, they're still pretty unrestrained and over-the-top, which is what I liked about them in the first place.  And while the vocal performance is pretty awful, I at least give it some credit for attempting to be more varied, and I suppose "Entombed with the Pharaohs" is decent enough to at least be a b-side from In Hatred's Flame.  I hate to pull the Torture Squad card and constantly compare everything this band does to one release, but it's so hard with that shadow looming overhead.  On its own, Beyond the Fall of Time is an ultimately forgettable technical thrash album with bad vocals and cool guitars, but as a followup to In Hatred's Flame, it's a complete, laughable failure.  There are flashes of the band's previous brilliance here and there, but it's almost always in the form of grey reimaginings of what we already know they can do better.  Maybe the new vocals are the biggest problem, or maybe it's the plasticky production, I'm not sure entirely.  The whole package is less than the sum of its parts, and really it's not worth seeking out.


RATING - 41%

Artas - The Healing

Jemand hat in meinen Koffer geschissen!

Ever come across one of those albums that you enjoy even though you know it's shit?  Like, you can point out specific reasons why it's terrible, why certain ideas don't work and why they never would have, where the band fails and why, but there's some enduring charm that keeps you hooked despite the obvious, glaring flaws.  We all have a few of those.  I have The Sword's debut, despite its awful drum production and lazy vocals, Arsis's United in Regret despite hilariously feeble themes and slapdash songwriting, and a few others I plan on getting to in the future.  And then there is Artas.  What Arnold Schwarzenegger is to acting, these Austrian dorks are to music .  They're not very good, but god bless them they're trying.  Their failure is in a way, the exact reason they're so entertaining.  Nobody can deliver a hammy one-liner quite like Arnie can, and not many bands can rip off both The Crown and Disturbed in three separate languages in the same song.  Give Arnie a giant machine gun and watch him eat Green Berets for breakfast; give Artas a big, silly breakdown and watch them play it twice as fast as they're supposed to.  Arnold is the king of silly, over-the-top action flicks, something that sucks on a purely cinematic standpoint.  The stories are cliche and dumb and the acting is usually awful, but the violence is ridiculous on Tom and Jerry levels and are packed with so much comedy (intentional and not) that they're just a blast to watch, and you'll never catch me turning down an opportunity to watch The Running Man.  Artas takes two cliched and played out styles (metalcore and nu metal) and throws about four songs too many at you, but mixes in a healthy dose of death/thrash attitude and riffing, polyglot lyrics, and the stupidest shit imaginable played with the most headstrong enthusiasm you're bound to ever hear.

The nu metal influence is a huge turnoff to most, and I'm firmly in the camp that really doesn't like it at all apart from fleeting moments of nostalgia from when I was eleven years old and had a mohawk because I'm a special kind of idiot.  But the way the influences are presented on The Healing are so earnest and blended so confidently with the highly metallic metalcore ala As I Lay Dying and the high speed death/thrash influences like my beloved The Crown (never name your band "The [singular noun]", it makes sentences awkward as fuck) that it never really feels all that out of place.  This was their plan all along, they just dug this style as much as the others and made it work somehow.  "Through Dark Gates" could straight up be a Korn song (unsurprisingly it's the worst track on the album), but much like "AAA" from one of my absolute favorites, Strapping Young Lad's City it's merely one strange quirk that sticks out in the grand scheme of things.  Then there's "Kontrol", which is the otherwise most overtly nu metal influenced track, but the goofy, Turisas-style chorus of "LA LA LA LAAA LA LA LALA LA LA" is such an ohrwurm that I can't stay mad at it, despite the rest of the song sounding like it a b-side to The Sickness.

But strip the nu metal influence away and you're left with a very heavy and thrashy take on metalcore, somewhat akin to what Fedhja did before mercifully splitting up two years ago.  The title track is one of the most obvious examples of what I guess you could call their signature style, if such a thing exists.  It's really and truly an As I Lay Dying styled metalcore song with a strong thrash bent, a catchy chorus, big breakdown, and strange nu metally "BWIP!  BWIP!" vocal flourishes that he spits during transition riffs.  That's what The Healing really is down at its core, it's a bizarre mixture of three or four styles that are all apparently related juuuuust enough to prevent the album from sounding like a hackneyed mess.  I keep using the same couple bands for reference, but that's really what this sounds like.  Take the core elements of The Haunted, The Crown, As I Lay Dying, and Disturbed and put them together, that's Artas.

I can't stress enough how catchy The Healing is, it's stupid but I find myself quietly singing the choruses to "Barbossa", "The Healing", and "I Am Your Judgment Day" under my breath when I think nobody can hear me.  They all feature the same elements I've been gabbing on about, and they're all stupid and fun.  For some, the first word there can really turn some people off, and I don't blame them.  The lyrics are juvenile as hell at times.  Hell, take a look at the few English lines in "Bastardo" (a song entirely sung in Spanish)

Don’t care about the familia
Give a fuck about the policía
Your rules cause diarrhea
My amigos smoke sensimilla

And that's the chorus... Yeah it can be a problem.  If I could speak/read/understand Spanish or German, the other two languages used heavily throughout the album (I'd say it's maybe 40% German, 30% Spanish, 30% English) I'm sure I'd be able to find dozens of other stupid sections.  I mean hell, they cover Coolio's "Gangsta's Paradise".  Just... right there in the middle of the album like it ain't no thang.  And weirdly enough it actually fits, thanks to the ever prevalent nu metal influence.

If this review has turned you off and made you believe The Healing is destined to be awful, then welcome to the club.  I'm amazed I like this at all, it has so many components that are made of nothing but pure failure incarnate, but I can't help but enjoy it for it's starry eyed enthusiasm.  This is a very earnest and well meaning record, despite how silly it can be at times, and that's why I like it.  Artas is a band of youthful exuberance and enthusiastic vibrancy, and it shows here.  I never once doubt for a second that these guys couldn't give less of a shit about their peers or "haters" (man I hate that term) if they tried.  They're doing this because they love it, not because it might make them money.  I feel like there's a pure hearted naivete behind the music, and that's very charming.  Despite the weird choices and juvenile ideas and nu metal influence, I can't help but find The Healing to be rather endearing.  I don't expect most people reading this to like it, but the fact remains that in spite of myself, I do, and I find that it's a lot of fun to spin.  NO SHAME.


RATING - 75%

Deathchain - Deathrash Assault

There's a track called "Napalm Satan", that's all you need to know

I imagine that my first encounter with this album is similar to most death/thrash fans' first encounter.  "Deathchain?  Well that's a fucking awesome name.  What's the name of the album?  Deathrash Assault?  Hmmm, reminds me of Deathrace King.  What's that?  The album cover is a simple black and grey affair like the Crown album I thought of?  Great, we've got a clone on our hands here".  And upon first listen, that's exactly what I thought.  Looks like The Crown, sounds like The Crown, it must be a duck.  So I shelved this as another entertaining but ultimately hollow recreation of a greater band.

Years passed, and a chain of events lead me to dust this off and give it another run.  I don't know why, but absence truly does seem to make the heart grow fonder, because this is not the imitation that I remember it being.  What were once stock riffs have become aggressive monsters, what were once forgettable vocals have become versatile and malicious, and what were once forgettable Crown rip offs have become intense Deathchain rippers.  Not sure why, this is the same album, but it just doesn't have the ability to grab a listener upon first listen.  It takes some resilience to keep coming back to it I suppose, but once this thing latches, it doesn't let go.  And yes, my initial criticism does still ring true, this sounds like the Swedish speed junkies I love so much, complete with their trademark addiction to insane tempos and over the top lyrics.  That said, this connection is far from a bad thing here, as it doesn't sound like they're stealing a great idea as much as they just happened to have another great idea that happens to be similar to one that was already proven to work.

As I mentioned in the title, Deathrash Assault was predestined to kick ass before it was even released.  The reason for this is simply for this; there is a track entitled "Napalm Satan".  Read that again, say it out loud.  "Napalm Satan".  I dare you, I fucking dare you to come up with a better song, album, or band name than that.  Napalm.  Satan.  I love that name more than my hypothetical first born midget kid.  I thought Fleshgod Apocalypse or "Blitzkrieg Witchcraft" were gonna be hard to beat, but this is an entirely different level of awesome, kids.  Just saying it out loud puts an extra strand of hair on your chest.  There is not a single combination of two words that are more manly, more metal, more brutal, more insane, more anything than Napalm Satan.  I'm calling it right now, I'm calling dibs on Napalm Satan for the name of my band.  I'm actually willing to go as far as to say that, based on their first two records, Deathchain is the undisputed champion of two word song titles.  "Graveyard Witchery", "Chaos Wartech", "Venom Preacher", "Deathrash Legions", "Panzer Holocaust", "Rabid Vultures", there is no way that any of these songs could suck.  Deathchain have nailed the badass aesthetics of metal that we all love so much absolutely perfectly, these guys fly over the top and don't even think about looking back.  This is honestly comparable to Rocky IV.  The aesthetics are so over the top in their silliness yet at the same time meant to be taken 100% seriously, yet it's done so damn convincingly that it's hard not to like it.  Bands like White Wizzard make you roll your eyes, bands like Deathchain make you fucking thrash.

Now I'm well aware that I just spent an entire paragraph rambling about how great the mere titles of the songs are, so one is probably wondering when I'll get to the point and explain whether or not the tracks behind the titles are equally awesome.  Honestly, these songs could be titled "Tea Party in Fairyland" or "Dirk Schlacter Sleepover" and they'd still absolutely fucking slay.  The only time the tempo goes below blistering is during "Panzer Holocaust" in favor of a bizarrely bouncy chugging pattern for the verses, complete with equally bouncy vocal patterns, and during the haunting bridge of "Valley of the Corpses".  Despite these sections deviating from the overall theme of speed, intensity, and speed (with a little bit of speed thrown in for good measure), they are actually welcome breathers as opposed to confusing flow breakers.  I believe the reasons these breaks are made aren't actually because the band wanted them to be there for songwriting purposes, but instead because no fans would survive to the end of the record without them.  Deathrash Assault never lets up, and this is the record's main strength since this shit is practically unstoppable when firing on all cylinders.  The first seven tracks are all absolute modern death/thrash classics as far as I'm concerned, and six out of those seven run at an average pace of 8675309 bpm.  I hate to keep comparing this band to The Crown, but I have to point out that they have not only managed to play a similar style with equal ferocity, but they were even able to replicate the ability to make their songs catchy as hell.  There are a lot of gang shouts utilized throughout the record, which is kind of strange with harsh vocals but it makes certain sections of the music stand out.  Check out the choruses to "Venom Preacher" or "Graveyard Witchery", or the bridge of "Deathrash Legions" and tell me that the thrash trope doesn't work better here than most pure thrash bands could ever hope to make it work.  This could also be due in part to Rotten's incredibly versatile vocals, ranging from deep death growls to the Schmier-esque rasp that he seems to favor.  He does occasionally tend to drift into a range that makes him sound a lot like Colony era Anders Friden, which typically isn't the best sound, but he manages to make it fit with the thrashing intensity that dominates the record.

Death/thrash fans who haven't heard this are definitely missing out.  From what I've been able to gather, the band has taken a turn for the more death metal side of things since Rotten left after this album, and it seems many fans aren't satisfied.  While I haven't heard anything post-2005, I can understand why fans could be disappointed, as the high octane thrash is definitely the band's forte if Deathrash Assault is anything to go by.  If there's anything wrong with this album, it's that "Morbid Mayhem" is a bit of a filler track and the album as a whole doesn't seem to click instantly, and therefore you may run the risk of not getting caught up initially.  Maybe I'm just a retard though, as everything his is as catchy as it is brutal, so who knows?  Either way, definitely check this out, and be sure to start every morning with a healthy dose of "Napalm Satan".


RATING - 92%

Merciless - Unbound

 Their "I" is dotted with a Skulltula

I've been a metalhead for essentially my entire life (thanks, Mom), and yet somehow Sweden's Merciless managed to slip under my radar until recently. Being the first band signed to and bearing your name on the first release by Deathlike Silence records is a pretty big deal in the metal underground. That debut, The Awakening is known to be an early death/thrash classic. Those two points alone make it baffling that I hadn't managed to stumble across this band earlier. I'll admit, I've yet to hear that legendary debut, and this, Unbound, is my first foray into Merciless's sick, demented world. And frankly, I plan on pitching a tent and staying in this desolate, ravaged world for a while.

Frankly, this really early style of death metal is probably my favorite style of music, but it's also the hardest to review. I love the hell out of Massacra, Agressor, Messiah, Revenant, and the like, but I've yet to review any of it because I really don't know how to articulate my love. This primal death/thrash is the hot, popular cheerleader to my socially awkward and obsessed nerd. There's nothing wrong with it, I love every little thing about it. I have a small shrine in my closet dedicated to it. There are a dozen almost-gone candles surrounding a marble altar with Enjoy the Violence perched at the top. Yet every time I convince myself that this is the time, that this is my shot to prove I'm not a square and that I can be worthy, it just kicks the living shit out of me and I have to go back to my room and worship from afar, sniveling like the bitch it made me. Merciless, being early progenitors of this style, accomplish the ass kicking as well as any other band in the genre. Unbound leans towards the thrashier side of the death/thrash balance that I love so much, but it still manages to blend the razor sharp riffwork of thrash with the punchiness of death metal. It's this brutal equilibrium that makes this sound so fantastic, and even though this isn't quite as balanced as some of the other bands I've mentioned, it's without a doubt more than competent enough to brain the snot out of you for saying it's flawed as a result.

The main strength in Unbound is that it rarely lets up, but it still does let up occasionally to keep the album fresh. It starts with a soft, acoustic intro before bursting out into some early Kreator styled death/thrash riffage. Each song continues the main theme of razorpunching the listener with unrivaled aggression, while simultaneously weaving in a melodic twist. I don't know why, but Sweden seems to have some law forbidding anything musical from being mainly atonal. Now don't confuse my point, melody is important, no doubt, and this particular album benefits from it. It sounds like the kind of thing Deceased would go on to thrive off of. The mixture is rather top notch here, as the mix of raw aggression and subtle melody never sounds forced or awkward. Everything is part of one cohesive monster. The one flub seems to be the 8 minute beast in "Back to North". Halfway through the track, the song abruptly stops, and plays around with a quiet, haunting instrumental section. It's less than a minute long and really isn't intrusive, but it's the one time that the songwriting seems to wander a bit. Thankfully, Merciless never lose their focus again throughout the album. Rogga carries a fairly typical voice for the style, but it works fabulously. It isn't quite a death metal growl, it isn't a thrashy rasp, it isn't a throaty scream, it's some unholy mixture of the three. Imagine a thicker, deeper Mille Petrozza and you're pretty close to the mark.

Unbound is essentially a blueprint for this very specific style I have such a raging boner for, and as a result, it's well worth anybody's time. The dirty production and hard edged riffing compliment each other extraordinarily. Looking back, I find I haven't really been able to express what makes this album so damn good, and it's precisely why I typically stray away from writing about this style. It has to be heard, and you'll surely convert when you hear it. It's hard to explain simply through text what makes a riff awesome or a song memorable. All that really needs to be known is that apart from some confusing song structuring here and there, this album does basically everything right. From the churning of "Back to North", to the pure thrash insanity of "Nuclear Attack", the more traditional metal moments of "Lost Eternally", and supernatural quality of "The Land I Used to Walk", nothing is half assed or mediocre.

RATING - 91%

Alter Self - Ashes over Eden

Nothing to really see here

While the album art of this Greek band's first, and currently only, demo screams of melocore posturing, the actual music underneath thankfully manages to carry a sharper edge reminiscent of The Crown. Ashes over Eden leans predominately towards the Thrash side of the Death/Thrash style, and there aren't any complaints from me about that. Alter Self is a competent band, but one that I feel hasn't come into their own quite yet. There isn't any shameless emulation to be found here, but there's very little that makes me say "FUCK YEAH" and start thrashing like a maniac. The solo and middle break in the title track is easily the highlight of this 15 minute romp, but the rest just kind of goes on through the background and never really grabs your attention. The vocalist from Alter Self's painfully mediocre countrymen, Dark Vision, makes a guest appearance on "Wither", but it honestly isn't that noticeable. Guest vocalists can be a neat feature if it's somebody with a recognizable voice and/or established background, like when Tomas Lindberg guested on The Crown's Deathrace King. Having your guest vocalist hail from an equally unknown band with a dime a dozen voice doesn't help you stand out at all. I know I've mentioned The Crown twice already, but that's really what Alter Self sounds like; a passable, but not enthralling, and less speed obsessed version of the legendary Swedes. Give it a listen if you've got nothing else going on, but don't go out of your way for it.

RATING - 59%

Lair of the Minotaur - War Metal Battle Master

Just when you thought there were no more steps...

They step up another step. Lair of the Minotaur reigns as pretty much the only band from my hometown region (Chicago) that I can stand. To me, they sound like a hybrid of death/thrash metal with a kind of stoner/doom tone, which is fucking awesome. To call them doom metal would be a hideous misnomer though, as this is faster than any doom band would ever attempt to play.

War Metal Battle Master ranks as their best album so far, topping the amazing The Ultimate Destroyer. Even if you can't stand the music, every metal fan can appreciate the extreme cheese of the song/album titles. Choice names from this album include Horde of Undead Vengeance, Black Viper Barbarian Clan, Slaughter of the Bestial Legion, and War Metal Battle Master. And once again, just like the last two albums, the quality of the music is proportional to the cheese of the titles.

I can understand the criticisms that get hurled at the band, as they have an extremely distorted and/or fuzzy guitar tone, but I believe it complements the attitude perfectly. Destructive would be a good adjective to describe the music. I know it doesn't sound super descriptive on paper, but that's one of the only words one can come up with upon hearing the music. Each and every riff (and trust me, there's about a metric fuckton of 'em) just feels like Sleipnir was outfitted with spiked horseshoes and trained to stomp on your groin. Most of the songs are high speed thrashing death monsters, with the only notable exception being the nearly ten minute Doomtrooper which is, as the title implies, closer to doom in terms of speed and riffage. Assassins of the Cursed Mist gives of a Motorhead-esque vibe to me, which is a very good thing. What this does though, is makes the song sound similar to some of the newer High on Fire, who are essentially a slower, sludgier Motorhead. This kind of takes away from Lair of the Minotaur's fresh originality, but it's not a big deal in the long run.

The only places the album feels lacking are in the two tracks I just mentioned. Doomtrooper is an unwelcome change of pace that seems to break the flow more than add variety to me. Assassins of the Cursed Mist has about three or four of those annoying "everything but the guitar drops out for three seconds before the whole band kicks in again with a badass scream". It's a cool technique when used sparingly, but it makes the song seem disjointed when used so many times in the same track, but now I'm just nitpicking.

In all, the first five tracks are some of the best the band has ever put out, but a few problems with the later tracks take the album away from the coveted perfect score. It is by no means a flawed album, just not perfect (if that makes any sense). So to conclude, brutality at it's finest with one of the best examples of cheese outside of a power metal context to be found in metal. A hell of a lot of fun to crank and headbang to. Highly recommended.

RATING - 95%

Exmortus - In Hatred's Flame

Oodles and oodles of noodles

And what a delicious soup we get! In Hatred's Flame is essentially ruthlessness defined, and so far stands as a prime contender for the "Best of 2008" award. The combination of modern thrash, melodic death metal, and Bodomesque wankery all meld into one cohesive and overwhelmingly impressive whole. The three styles mentioned above seem to be scorned and looked down upon in a lot of high profile metal circles, but believe me when I say that the sheer mercilessness of the record and masterful cohesion turn the three lumps of coal into one big sparkling diamond.

I'm not exaggerating when I say that nearly 60% of the record is dominated by constant fretboard wizardry and extremely fast melodic lead work. All of the riffs here are a top notch blend of Swedish melodic death and Germanic thrash metal, and a complex harmony is almost always layered across the top, making for a never ending showcase of over the top musicianship and unrelenting intensity. And the best part about that is the fact that the band never comes off as merely a collection of music instructors battling to grasp the listeners attention with unending frills and technique. They instead combine themselves into one giant being; all of the Zords were cool and unique, but they meant jack shit until they made the Megazord. And with the strength of a giant mechanized war machine and the heart of the five young saviors of Angel Grove (the enormous mutant attack capitol of the world), Exmortus proceeds to relentlessly murder Goldar over and over and over again, each way more fanciful and choreographed than the last, but never losing it's savage edge that comes naturally with the form... Excuse me while I go throw myself down a flight of stairs for that analogy.

I usually find vast amounts of praise purely for the melding of styles, regardless of quality, to be foolish, so keep in mind that it takes one hell of an effort to truly win me over if a band tries to play that card. Understandably, most seasoned metalheads would be weary when hearing about an extreme melding of neoclassical shredmeister wankage with Swedish melodeath and thrash, a horse whose carcass I thought was decayed and eviscerated to the point that there was in fact no meat left to beat (pardon the innuendo). When these four Californian thrashers discovered the corpse, they indeed beat the dead horse, but they beat it with such determination and in such a maniacally stylish manner that one can't help but stare in bewilderment at the spectacle. Take, for example, the track Axes of War. In these three minutes and fifteen seconds, there are roughly seven thousand different diminished arpeggio sweeps, fourteen tapping solos, eighty five and a half harmonized shreds, and ninety one riffs underneath. They leave no room for doubt when it comes to their technical skill, and listening to any five second snippet of any song is essentially definitive proof. And for all of the noodles the two guitarists bring to the goulash, there is just as much meat in the pot to back it all up and provide a solid, nutritious backbone. The rhythm section is extremely solid and tight, consisting of a bassist who is content to sit in the background and support the riffage (save for his a capella intro to Valor and Might and quick run in Fimbulwinter) and a drummer that sports a wide array of techniques and flair, but doesn't feel the compulsive urge to tear out a tom fill every six nanoseconds (a trend that initially impressed me, but quickly grew tiring).

Most of the songs are formulaic and somewhat predictable in structure, but the actual riff writing is surprisingly creative for such a young band. The opening riff to Storms is a good example. It's a fairly simple tremolo riff played at an extremely high tempo, but the note changes are actually somewhat unconventional and unpredictable. It seems like a stupid thing to notice, let alone praise, but I used to write myself, so I'm somewhat inclined to notice subtle nuances like off time riff changes and countermelodies and such. And that is one of the reasons I hold so much respect for this album, it's a new take on an established style, energizing a stagnant genre in a way that only happens once every few years. There is probably one album with the energy and vision like this for every six hundred Slaughter of the Soul ripoffs we hear, and I haven't been this blown away by a melodic death metal release since Arsis' debut four years prior. It's a nearly unending aural assault of relentless technicality and unmeasurable charm. Even minor pratfalls like the vocalist's mediocrity and predictable song structure seem even smaller when surrounded by the sheer energy and intensity that the disc exudes.

I can only dribble so much before I become what I criticize. I bought this album months ago and my kiddish enthusiasm for it has yet to subside; even after tens of dozens of spins, the astonishment has yet to wear off. These kids make you believe in them. They didn't write a handful of songs that were in sync with the current trends and accepted measures of mediocre brutality. They didn't decide that Suffocation was the greatest band ever and become their umpteenth clone, nor did they do the same with At the Gates/In Flames. They didn't take the paths that so many other young'uns have decided to take in order for a quick and easy fifteen minutes of fame. They instead recorded eleven of the most intense, merciless, and technical tracks they could, then mooned every last band that tried what they did and failed. They said "To hell with stop start riffing! To hell with high and low alternating growls! To hell with breakdowns! We have come to destroy! We have come to double bass your girlfriends into spontaneous orgasm and shit on your dog while shredding out 320 bpm tapping solos while keg standing on your keg! That's how we roll, now make Exmortus some fuckin' sammiches you cunt."

RATING - 96%