Mantic Ritual at Myspace

Mantic Ritual’s Executioner is an example of the thrash revival being done right. Although it’s never too original, the riffs, leads and songwriting are strong as hell, resulting in an album that’s strong all the way through, and Mantic Ritual don’t make the same mistake as Blood Tsunami and make sure that the songs are actually heavy; there’s no over-melodic frippery here.

Executioner is a re-recording of an album recorded under the band’s previous name, Meltdown. I haven’t heard the original version, so I can’t comment on it, but the production on this is excellent throughout. Dan Wetmore’s vocals are excellent; at times, he appears to be invoking Kill ‘Em All-era James Hetfield in his delivery, but he mixes it up enough so he doesn’t feel like a total clone. The solos and riffs are also excellent; the album’s only real weakness is the rhythm section. The bass is barely audible and the drumming is especially weak; it just sounds repetitive, dull, and overly mechanical most of the time.

Still, despite that one major fault, this is a fine album and a worthy successor to the original wave of thrash bands. If only the rest of the movement was this strong…

Blood Tsunami at Myspace

Blood Tsunami’s sophomore effort is caught between two extremes. On one hand, the songwriting  is perfectly fine; they know how to write good riffs and the musicianship is excellent. The only truly poorly-written song in my opinion was the 13-minute instrumental Eceladus Rising, which has some good parts but just felt aimless overall. Unfortunately, the guitars just aren’t heavy enough for this material to work fully; for most of the album, there’s a distinct lack of the oomph that thrash metal needs to succeed. Instead of playing their songs in a brutally heavy style, the guitarists just glide along like a poorly animated CGI monster that’s far too agile for its size; there’s little sense of weight to these songs, however well constructed they are.

Compounding the problem is that the vocalist sings in a style that suits death metal more than Blood Tsunami’s brand of melo-thrash (and the backing vocals are even harsher). The contrast between the relatively light, melodic riffs and the growling vocals hurts the material greatly. That said, Grand Feast of Vultures is far from being a horrible album; it’s tightly played and never bogs down in repetition. It’s just that its limitations are highly disappointing and could be easily remedied.

Chainsaw at Myspace

Note to self: Don’t get an album solely because it contains a cover of a band you like. This goes double if that band is Spinal Tap.

First of all, this is the Chainsaw from Holland, not any of the seven other bands listed on Metal-archives with that name. (There are also no less than 20 bands named Armageddon, and those are just the ones who managed to spell it correctly.) Chainsaw plays thrash metal that just doesn’t distinguish itself from the crowd. The playing isn’t offensive or anything, it’s just pedestrian (with a few exceptions, such as godawful drumming on a few tracks and a few guitar solos which sound like the notes were chosen at random).

The lyrics try to be amusing and even socially relevant at times, but they just sound like a middle schooler trying to sound edgy. For example, here’s a verse from “Hand of God,” a song about plastic surgery:

I’ll cut you up I like it tight
I’ll lift your breasts because they just don’t look right
Your legs are fat I’ll suck them slim
I’ll re-create you until you look divine

I understand that English isn’t these guys’ first language, but I can’t ignore lyrics like this when the vocals are this lame. The singer sounds little better than some guy they brought in off of the street. Sometimes, he sounds like he’s just trying too hard to sound silly (admittedly, this might be because a Dutch accent just sounds weird to me for a thrash metal vocalist). And what about that cover that caused me to pick this up? Well, Spinal Tap’s “Tonight I’m Gonna Rock You Tonight” sounds lame when played by Chainsaw, although at least they didn’t go the obvious route and cover the Ramones’ “Chain Saw.”

“Metal Missionary” isn’t offensively bad; it’s just not very good and only worth picking up if you’re a really die-hard thrash fan.

Lich King at Myspace

Amherst’s Lich King combine Bay Area thrash worship with goofy lyrics to create an album that’s mostly for die-hard thrash fans only. Although the band claims to be a quintet, I suspect that it’s a one or two-man project, as the band lists among its personnel Darth Vader on bass, Hulk Hogan on drums, and A Fucking Tyrannosaur on vocals. Say, could you imagine what would’ve happened if Mr. A. F. Tyrannosaur had wanted to play guitar? They would’ve had to have custom-ordered a huge one to accomodate him, and even then his playing would’ve been highly constricted due to him having only two fingers on each hand. But I digress.

Songs include “Black Metal Sucks” (which is just a regular thrash song until the last 30 seconds, which are a riotous parody of the title genre), the hilariously-titled “Attack of the Wrath of the War of the Death of the Strike of the Sword of the Blood of the Beast,” and “Office Politics” (which is complete with a sample of Milton from Office Space). Although the lyrics are humorous, the music never quite manages to transcend its Bay Area influence, and just feels like thrash worship. Of course, this is a comedy album, so the music isn’t quite as important as the lyrics, which begs the question of why the mediocre instrumental “I Destroy” was included. Another track, “Predator,” recounts the film of the same name; Arnocorps already did this about a million times better. All in all, Toxic Zombie Onslaught is competently executed but fairly dull, and only moderately amusing.

Tyrant at myspace

Welcome to the early 1980’s as Tyrant (not to be confused with the band who would eventually evolve into The Legion) take us on a magical mystery tour through the best that Black/Thrash has to offer. Taking influence from Bathory, Venom, Motorhead, Darkthrone and Celtic Frost, “Reclaim the Flame” has a melodic groove; not melodic in a Gothenburg way, but melodic in a drunken singalong to “Ace of Spades” or “Black Metal” sort of way. The riffs and melodies get stuck in your head with minimal effort and you can’t help but sing along to mid paced thumpers like “Uprise”.

Like a lot of Black Metal inspired releases, the production isn’t pristine which is a godsend as this album wouldn’t be half as entertaining if it had the same productions as say the new Satyricon album. The grimy and deep guitar tone gives Tyrant the sort of guitar sound that Venom or Hellhammer would have killed for 25 years ago. This is a pretty big claim to make on the strength of a debut album, but I feel Tyrant may proves themselves over their discography in years to come to be the band that Darkthrone now want to be but seemingly aren’t able to be. Not the Darkthrone of lore, but the Darkthrone of “The Cult of Alive” and the following albums. Whereas “The Cult of Alive” was tedious after several listens, “Reclaim the Flame” is a captivating piece of singalong thrash/black metal. Hopefully Tyrant can keep this quality going for the rest of their careers, as “Reclaim the Flame” is a stellar debut.