Merciless Death at Myspace

Any album starting off and ending on with a musical homage to Death Angel’s “The Ultraviolence” by a band named after a Dark Angel song is enough to tell any thrash fan they are in for a good time. I would have expected a generic time too truth be told, but Merciless Death are one of the premier thrash revival bands in the world today and have their own distinct style that is pretty hard to compare with anyone else. It’s intense, violent, and is musically as occult as its lyrical themes with eerie Jeff Hanneman-esque solo’s as landmarks amongst the passionately speedy riffs and drum fills. Not a minute is wasted with Merciless Death playing at a faster tempo than most thrash bands thus meaning their album is 28 minutes whereas in the hands of someone such as say Evile it may be pushing towards the 40 minute mark.

Bassist Andy Torres is also the bands vocalist and his punk rock vocal technique has divided some of the more purist Thrash fans. The way I would describe his singing style is to imagine Jerry A of 80’s Hardcore punk band Poison Idea but with a bad throat infection and marbles in his mouth. It’s an acquired taste but although it definitely needs work I think it suits the music much better than someone warbling like they were in say Metal Church. This is thrash for the thrash fans, it’s not going to appeal to people who don’t love this genre a lot, but those who are addicted to the thrash will adore this record.

Exodus at Myspace

This is a strange review to do as this is basically if you’ve heard what “Bonded by Blood” sounds like, then you really aren’t doing this whole metal thing very well. “Bonded by Blood” is one of the cornerstones of heavy metal as we know it and although re-recording ones early works using better modern technology (see Testaments “First Strike Still Deadly” Destructions “Thrash Anthems” and Anthrax’s “The Greater of Two Evils”) the usual method is to record a greatest hits style package rather than a whole album especially one as influential as “Bonded by Blood”. This is a risky manoeuvre for sure and I’m not sure if it’s paid off.

The guitar’s sounds are more meaty and lower tuned and the recording is understandably of better quality but the one thing I miss the most is Paul Baloff’s vocals. Don’t get me wrong Rob Dukes is an extremely talented and charismatic vocalist and his work on “Let There Be Blood” is a measured and powerful take on these classics but it just doesn’t seem the same without Baloff’s vocals. Off key and slightly out of time are criticisms often thrown at Baloff’s performance on “Bonded by Blood” but his bizarre retching vocal style had a genuinely unhinged vibe that made lyrics such as “there’s blood upon the stage/bang you head against the stage” and “kick in your face and rape and murder your wife” sound as if they were the demented threats of a rampaging lunatic.

In the hands of any other vocalist those lines however sound goofy to the point of parody. It was Baloff’s frenzied and unsettling performance (which proved to be very influential on the likes of Chuck Schuldiner and John Tardy) that made “Bonded by Blood” into a work of malevolence that was as dark and frightening as any of Slayer and King Diamonds best. Without him the riffs are still stellar, and songwriting still streets ahead of this time let alone the standards of 1984 and 1985 but it just doesn’t have that evil threatening atmoshphere that made the original recording what it is. To finish the album, a track from 1983 never officially released as a studio recording entitled “Hells Breath” has been added presumably as an incentive to attract fans who already have the original “Bonded by Blood” to buy “Let There Be Blood”. It’s a charming Venom-esque number, but to be honest if you already have the original “Bonded by Blood” album, there’s no need to get this one.

Saviours at myspace

Mixing the old school classic rock of Thin Lizzy with the raging fast tempo stoner of High on Fire with the progressive experimentation of Baroness, Saviours are quite an intriguing proposition for Stoner Metal fans. Duelling lead guitars in a traditional heavy metal fashion are fused into a rhythm of resin soaked groove and a galloping rhythm section featuring the understated but powerful percussion of Scott Batiste.

Although this release can come under the banner of stoner metal it can be seen as basically a slightly diluted form of heavy metal itself. It’s as pure as any form of heavy metal that remains true to the greats of the genre whilst keeping the subsequent generations of thrash and those which came before it in reference. With one eye on the past and one on the future, Saviours are just one in a long line of bands creating metal that is both forward thinking but yet keeps the old traditions alive.

Blue Cheer are widely regarded as one of the very first metal bands. Vincebus Eruptum was their first album, which was released in 1968, two years before Black Sabbath’s debut. It’s not hard to see why they’re considered to be metal; unlike other bands in the San Francisco psychedelic scene, they used a heavily distorted guitar tone that was extremely unusual at the time.

Vincebus Eruptum is a pretty good album; it’s fairly tame by modern standards, but one has to wonder what went through listeners’ heads as they heard this for the first time. It’s short, clocking in at just over half an hour, with just six songs, but they’re all fairly good. There are three originals and three covers; the album opener, a cover of Eddie Cochran’s Summertime Blues, is the band’s best known song. There are some rather dull moments, such as the too-long solos in “Doctor Please” and “Second Time Around”, but for the most part, Vincebus Eruptum doesn’t have many wasted moments. The bass is easily audible throughout, which is also a plus.

One has to wonder why Blue Cheer isn’t better known, since they were one of the first metal bands. This is probably due to two factors. One is the fact that the band went through a series of tumultuous lineup changes following their second album, Outsideinside, and broke up in the early 70s. The band did not reunite until the mid-80s. Another factor is that while many metal bands owe much to Blue Cheer musically, their lyrics and atmosphere were a holdover from 60s psych rock. Blue Cheer’s lyrics weren’t gloomy, like Black Sabbath, or epic, like Led Zeppelin’s lyrics; they’re pretty much a product of the time.

I highly recommend Vincebus Eruptum to those who are curious about the early history of metal, or who also enjoy 60′s psych rock or blues.

Metallica at Myspace

I didn’t have high hopes for the new Metallica album and since you’ve all heard at least the singles from “St Anger” I’m sure you know why. According to producer Bob Rock the reason “St Anger” failed was because it had “no real songs” and one look at the half a hook monstrosity that was the title track would conclude most of us to agree. Others would say the real issue was Metallica’s continuing divergence away from metal. “Load” and “Reload” were both decent if not inspiring bluesy hard rock pieces, and “St Anger” was basically a more aggressive version of those works but without any of the songwriting skill.

The questions we have to ask therefore are; are Metallica metal once again and can they write real songs? The answer to both of those questions is in the affirmative. The music on “Death Magnetic” takes influence from both Thrash Metal and Hard Rock but it’s the former that’s in the ascendance here and the songwriting is as complex and progressive as Metallica’s mid 80’s glory days whilst still bearing the infectious catchiness of the black album. This is easily their best album since the black album by a long long margin and although it doesn’t touch their classic stuff, it still blows quite a good portion of the 21st century releases by 80’s metal bands out of the water

Stylistically the music draws not only from the first 5 Metallica albums but surprisingly from other metal bands as well. I can’t be the only one who remembers one of Metallica (I think it was James) proclaiming his love for the White stripes and Interpol in interviews around the time of St Anger’s release and saying he didn’t really listen to much metal anymore. Well it looks like they do now, as “Death Magnetic” shows they’ve been listening around to quite a few of their contemporaries from the 80’s thrash scene. You cannot deny the influence of Slayer on this album, and the occasional section of riffs brings to mind the likes of Anthrax and Exodus more than it does Metallica. This is still an album that is definitely Metallica through and through though.

It’s not all good news though; there are some tracks which just don’t work. “All Nightmare Long” is the albums most chaotic and adventurous track but for all those wild and reckless solo’s, the track seems to be on the fast lane to nowhere in particular and just seems to be an excuse for Kirk and James to prove they can still shred as fast as they did on “Kill Em All”. The worse track however is “The Unforgiven III” which is so bad I wouldn’t have been surprised to see it on “St Anger”. It’s cheesy, pretentious and mawkish though bizzarely at 5:42 it has the best solo on the album; a bluesy Randy Rhoads style number which is wasted on such a musical turd.

The positives however outweigh the negatives considerably with “That Was Just Your Life” getting the album off to a flying start with a whiskey fuelled vicous kick to the face. “Broken, Beat and Scarred” features an anthemic bridge that seemingly can’t be topped until you hear the even more anthemic chorus. The standout track though is “The Judas Kiss” which is easily the best thing Metallica have done for eighteen years. It has everything you could want from a Metallica song; riffs clashing against riffs, supercharged solos, and a racing chorus that gets stuck in your head like an Aqua song but except in a good way.

“The Judas Kiss” with its “Masters of Puppets” meets “The Black Album” sensibility is a contender for one of the best dozen or so metal songs of 2008 at least at this stage in the year, but “Death Magnetic” is more in the top 50 albums of the year so far than the top ten. It’s pretty good and its better than the recent albums by Judas Priest, Iron Maiden and Megadeth, but I don’t think it measures up to the latest albums by the likes of Nachtmystium, The Rotted and Earth in terms of quality in the scheme of things. Metallica are of their time, but if for the next few years they keep making decent pieces of 80’s style heavy metal like this, I doubt they will get too many complaints. It’s not “St Anger mark II” but it’s not “Master of Puppets Mark II” either. It’s a pretty good metal album, and five years ago I didn’t think Metallica were still capable of that, so who knows what they can pull out of the hat for their next album.