From start to finish this
album is a total early
Slayer/
Sepultura (
Beneath/
Arise era)-worship thrash masterpiece!
You might think that "
Awaiting The Kill" was the next "
Hell Awaits" (without the backwards vocals) - with the exceptionally long and thrashy introduction to it. You can tell this song is going to blaze into all-out riff-fury by the first couple of minutes. And sure enough, the song does.
Total fucking thrasher!
"8th
Great Hell" would be awesome but it's too short!
It's like Slayer's "
Piece By Piece" - a good song but far too short to be excellent.
"
Death,
Judgement,
Fate" is nothing new. Just more over-the-top death metallish thrash headbanging madness.
"
Burning Red,
Burn Til' Death" is a real treat, where the guitarist shows off his excellent lead-guitar skills! The solos in this song are fucking sweet as hell. Being from
Japan, this song is about the
Kamikaze Pilots crashing into US
Battleships in World War II. Insanely killer warlike song, but the amazing solos are what really make this song stand out.
"End of an Ace", "
World Wide War", "
Scars of
Battle", and the title track are all of similar stuff. It takes a while to actually find the
difference between the four of them, but it's there! They aren't just
15 minutes or so of monotonous thrash metal with a few breaks in between! However, despite being good and all, they aren't really worth glaring over.
Good riffs, fast as hell, but really that's what this album is so I won't go on and on about songs that are the same in nature!
"The
Wrath". Now this is fucking nice. A huge change of pace from the relentless fury of every track and down we go into some galloping triplet frenzy. Total headbanging madness.
Easily one of the most memorable songs on here. The solo is sweet as hell too!
"
Escape From
The Light" is quite different. It features some accoustic guitar work and some clean vocals. However the song, when it goes into it's heavier verses, seems to struggle to do so. By far the weakest song on the album.
Now, my CD has 5 bonus tracks. One, an original, called "
Far East Aggressors" and 4 covers, including one of
Metallica's "
Hit The Lights".
"Far East Aggressors" is hella catchy, considering how aggressive this band can be! An excellent song!
"Hit The Lights", originally by Metallica, is an okay cover, though it just doesn't do with that old-school production and wierd vocal shriek/singing Hetfield had for the album. Decent cover, but bad production and the vocals don't fit.
The other covers are "
The End's
Demise" (whoever originally did it, I don't know and don't have the album with me
... I apologize for that but there was nothing special about it anyways), "
Fuck off and Die” by Grinder, and "
No Compromise" by
Defiance. I have not heard the originals but there was nothing special about any of them.
All in all, worshippers of old-school thrash should definitely pick this up! From start to finish it's a relentless fury of juicy, thrashy guitar riffs and insane drumming. The only complaints are the vocals. They are sort of death-metallish, but the main problem is that they are mixed too low! With the guitars, bass, and drums, the vocals are low in volume and sometimes it is hard to hear whatever it is he is growling, though he sings fast so it's not like you'd automatically be able to sing along with every word right from the get-go.
And of course, this album isn't anything new or original, yet that isn't a bad thing.
Pure old-school thrash! I encourage fans of newer
Sodom,
Destruction, Sepultura (from everything up to and including Arise), and Slayer (especially
Reign In Blood) to check these guys out! You won't be dissappointed. ©
2000
- published: 23 Mar 2016
- views: 0