Thrash metal – Page 44 – Wonderbox Metal

Inner Sanctum – Legions Awake (Review)

Inner Sanctum are an Indian Thrash/Groove Metal band and this is their début album.

After a rather cinematic opener, Inner Sanctum reveal themselves in their full glory as Thrash/Groove Metal with some Death Metal influences included for added impact. Think the mid-00s-type NWOAHM, only with a darker, more classically Death Metal side to it that emphasises the European Melodic Death Metal heritage of the American style.

The album boasts a sexy, professional sound that’s polished and strong.

The singer has a gruff voice that shouts out with the best of them, occasionally including some semi-cleans that remind me of some of Darkane’s work in places.

The songs are well-written and it’s clear that these tracks have been constructed with care and enthusiasm. The Thrash and Groove influences never take over or embrace the mediocre side of both styles; Inner Sanctum play their brand of heaviness with vibrancy and passion. They deliver everything on here with skill and it’s clear that the band have the talent to succeed.

Legions Awake is a strong collection of songs that make a good impression and showcase a band who really know what they’re doing. If they were American and picked up by a large music label then they would get very far indeed, I think. Unfortunately that isn’t the case, so make sure you support them – bands like this deserve it.

For fans of – Pantera, Lamb of God, Chimaira, Shadows Fall, Darkest Hour, Legion of the Damned, Kreator, Arch Enemy, Testament, etc.

Interview with Suppressive Fire

Suppressive Fire’s début album Bedlam ticks all of the right boxes as far as Death/Thrash Metal goes, from the riotous album cover to the gritty, catchy songs. I donned some body armour and stepped into the fray…

Give us a bit of history to Suppressive Fire

Greetings and thanks for talking with us. I’m Joseph Bursey, the guitarist in Suppressive Fire. The band begin with the simple goal of playing fast and aggressive music. I put out a classified ad and was nearly ready to give up until Brandon Smith (drummer) answered my call. We hit it off great, riffs wrote themselves and soon we found our capable bassist/vocalist Aaron Schmidt who was originally going be our second guitarist, the dude shreds, but we decided to move as a 3-piece which has been working great for us.

What are your influences?

Everything fast, dirty, and offensive. I love 70’s rock like old Scorpions, Thin Lizzy, ZZ Top, but I also love some 80’s thrash. I guess the more German thrash bands like Kreator and Sodom are pretty big influences on me. Brandon’s our resident ex-punk made death metal guru. The dude loves all that techy stuff and honestly barely listens to thrash and then we have Aaron who loves doomier stuff and bands like Sleep. We’re all over the place but we’ve come together I think with great dynamics because of it.

What are you listening to at the moment that you would like to recommend?

All Hell – The Red Sect! This is seriously one of the best albums to come out of North Carolina. They’re like a punky blackened thrash and they put on one hell of a live show.

Love the album cover – tell us about this

Thanks! I feel like Par Olofsson caught what we wanted very well. I wanted album art to represent not only the music that was coming, but also some of the story unfolding within. Par illustrated this in a very Mad Max meets modern dystopia type setting wonderfully.

Give us a bit of background to Bedlam – any particular concepts or ideas you want to discuss?

Bedlam is much more than simple chaos. Nearly half of the album kind of follows a theme. Ceasefire starts with government betrayal, The Hellwraith follows our mysterious gas-masked ghoul who’s kind of controlling and steering everything into chaos, Coup d’etat is the uprising of people against the State, Crucify the Kings is the actual execution of all false leaders of our world, and we close with Bedlam, everything that’s left in absolute carnage. There’s a lot of other songs that fill in between that aren’t really tied to it, like Nazi Face Melter that’s pretty much just about Indiana Jones – Raiders of the Lost Ark, and Thy Flesh Consumed which is the demon’s perspective in the video game Doom. We’re just having a ton of fun and didn’t really aim for a concept album, it’s just that our style really came together and made one on its own.

How do you go about writing your songs?

I really just start writing riffs with no real end goal and listen back to them and classify them. Some may sound like good openers, mid-section riffs, verses, choruses, ya know, proper song writing! We come up with riffs either at practice on the fly or I’ll have a great riff come to me and have to hum it into my phone’s recorder because I’m busy driving! There’s no rules here!

How did the recording process go?

Recording went very well. Having had recorded our demo and the ‘Covered in Conflict’ split, we were pretty much ready to reload and attack a full album. Greg Klaiber did an amazing job capturing the sound we wanted. Joel Grind also did an amazing job. We played with his band Toxic Holocaust a few weeks before hand so I was very happy he had a chance to hear us live before mixing and mastering it. The best compliment we’ve gotten so far is simply that our album sounds just like us. No bullshit and straight forward speedy thrashy metal.

What’s your favourite song on the album and why?

That’s a tough one! I think I’ll have to go with the title track itself. Bedlam is a song where we threw everything we had at it. Like, 3 more songs could have been written with the riffs invested in it. The song was the most recently written song and definitely shows a lot of progress as we’ve gotten more used to writing together. It’s also really fun to play live!

What’s next for the band?

Unleashing Bedlam on the world! We’ll be hitting the road January/February. ‘Bedlam’ releases on 1/14 and we’re doing a 4-date run that weekend across North and South Carolina, then we’ll be joining Hot Graves for a 9-date tour of Florida, South Carolina, and Georgia. We’ll also be playing with Warbringer, Exmortus and our friends Gorbash in February, 2/21 at the Pour House in Raleigh. We’re returning back North this summer as well! Then I guess more writing. I already have a lot of ideas for album #2.

Villainy – Villainy II: Dim (Review)

Villainy are from the Netherlands and this, (as the name would suggest), is their second album. They play Metal.

Their début album was enjoyable Thrash Metal with a few added elements of styles like Crust, Black Metal and Celtic-Frost-esque Metal to make things more interesting than your average Thrash band. It demonstrated a group who were not content to be mediocre and were striving the be different.

Well, on Villainy II: Dim they’ve progressed even further. This new album is more ambitious than the first and their Thrash Metal core is further enhanced by Doom and Black Metal influences, more so than the first.

The songs have a lot of ideas, depth and real potential for lasting impact. Featuring a surprising amount of variety over the 12 tracks, this is well-written Metal that doesn’t allow the listener’s attention to wane or wander.

Albums like this are a complete package, and by that I mean it’s a very holistic release with every song having its own identity, but still snugly fitting together as a whole.

The charisma and character of the singer has been brought further to the fore, and he sounds more confident and proficient than ever. Backed up by music that’s also more self-assured and expansive, this release is very impressive.

A strong, beefy guitar sound adds to the band’s delivery and the songs sound vibrant and fresh. Even though there’s a definite whiff of the Old-School about Villainy they have managed to produce an album that still sounds contemporary and relevant.

There’s over an hour of music on this release and no filler in sight. It’s always pleasing to see tangible progress in a band’s development and Villainy II: Dim is an impressively realised transition from what they were to what they are now becoming. Only time will tell where this will lead them.

This one’s a must.

Disquiet – The Condemnation (Review)

This is the second album from Dutch Melodic Thrash/Death Metal band Disquiet.

Disquiet play a heavy and aggressive brand of Thrash Metal with a nice Death Metal edge to it that means the band keep things dark and intense.

With plenty of jagged riffs and Metal leads, this is an album that it’s easy to feel at home with.

The singer varies his delivery between growls, shouts and what I’ll call almost-sung vocals – they’re almost sung, but not quite. Yeah, yeah, it may not be a very fancy description, but it suffices, and the end result is an added emotive edge to the vocals when there needs to be one without going full-blown into Metalcore-style cleans, for the most part.

I really like the production on this album and the thickness of the guitars. Everything else sounds top-drawer too and overall The Condemnation sounds quite immense.

If this album gets some good exposure I can see it doing very well indeed. It has the right combination of underground brutality and integrity combined with a songwriting skill that should ideally see them reaching a larger audience than a lot of their peers.

Recommended.

Suppressive Fire – Bedlam (Review)

Suppressive Fire are a Death/Thrash Metal band from the US. This is their début album.

I receive a lot of music promos, and I have to decide whether I’m going to give them a listen with a view to reviewing them, or not. There are lot of different ways I do this, lots of informal and flexible rules that sometimes vary quite a lot depending on how I’m feeling, what time of day it is, etc. Sometimes though, as with Suppressive Fire’s début, it’s all about the album cover. Something about the cover of Bedlam is just so unashamedly Thrash Metal, but without any retro-cheese-nonsense, that I just had to listen to it.

So here we are. As it turns out, sometimes you can judge the proverbial book by its cover.

Suppressive Fire play aggressive Old-School Death/Thrash Metal with a Blackened edge to it that makes it a far more aggressive proposition than most.

The songs are ugly, gritty and full of barely-contained spite. It’s pretty much a 50/50 mix of Death and Thrash Metal which gives the band an energetic sound that comes out in the riffs and galloping/blasting drums.

Featuring a suitably Old-School sound, the album rockets along powered by chemical weapons and nuclear fear. The guitars are riff-heavy and there’s plenty of solos to sink your teeth into.

It’s a decent collection of songs that have a subtle catchiness to them that initially seems buried under the barbed assault of the delivery, which essentially increases the longevity of the album as the songs don’t become too-familiar, too quickly.

So slip on the riot gear and descend into Bedlam.

Rash Decision – Headstrung (Review)

Rash Decision are from the UK and play Crossover Thrash/Hardcore.

Picking up from where Seaside Resort to Violence left off, Headstrung features 17 minutes of up-tempo violence.

The songs are short, simple and take a hearty chomp out of the musical landscape. This is a band who aren’t concerned with the subtleties of things and just want to Thrash it out with short songs and immediate impact.

Shouted vocals with a Hardcore tilt to them are well-performed and his voice is nicely hoarse.

The band have a good energy to them and sound like they’d be really good live. On their last release I liked the inclusion of Thrash influences without a stupid retro/ironic-vibe and this remains true of Headstrung – these tracks know when to be Hardcore and know when to be Metal and pay due respect to both genres.

It’s brief, but satisfying. Check it out.

https://rashdecision.bandcamp.com/

https://www.facebook.com/rashdecision/

Voros – Diseased Deity (Review)

Voros are a Death Metal band from Australia and this is their début album.

If heavy Death Metal with good riffs and pacing is your thing then look no further. Voros feature a thorough approach to Death Metal that sees them take the Classic style and infuse it with a modern energy.

Believe it or not, but Diseased Deity covers a lot of bases; Death, Thrash, Progressive, Technical and Modern Metal are all thrown into the blender and feed into this Death Metal feast.

The vocals are savage shouts full of anger and hatred which seem to lash out of the music like diseased barbs. The singer has a touch of the Meshuggah about him, giving his voice a different edge to that of the normal Death Metal vocalist.

The songs are well-written and see the band showing off what they do, whether it’s riff-hungry, mid-paced Thrashing, faster complexity or blasting destruction.

I like the combination of older and modern influences that give this a feel of Lamb of God and Gojira conspiring together to cover Morbid Angel, Death and Immolation tracks. It’s a really good way to approach this album; modern fire with tried-and-tested Old-School steel. On Diseased Deity it all comes together perfectly and the songs are an interesting, varied and engaging vision of what the band want to achieve.

The various influences work together very well to produce an album that takes from several different styles, with the band having enough skill and talent to make it all their own. Diseased Deity is very impressive and these songs have both immediate appeal and longevity of delivery.

This is a great find. I recommend you get hold of this immediately.

Aktaion – Throne (Review)

This is the début album by Swedish Metal band Aktaion.

This is sharp Melodic Metal that combines high-energy aggressive Melodic Death Metal with more restrained and emotive choruses. Elements of Thrash and Progressive Metal also raise their heads, (only to bang them all the harder). Continue reading “Aktaion – Throne (Review)”

Insanity – Visions of Apocalypse (Review)

Insanity are a Death Metal band from the US. This is their second album.

Featuring a sharp Old-School sound, Insanity’s brand of Death Metal is from a much older era, harking back to the 80s period. Death are a clear influence, (pre-Progressive Death Metal), and Insanity are equally as sharp in their delivery. Add this to a simpler, more straight-forward Death Metal style, à la early-Deicide, and you have honest songs that hit the spot more often than not.

Shining leads and solos make frequent grabs for the limelight and the drummer keeps a machine-like performance going throughout.

There’s decent variation within their musical framework and the songwriting concentrates on songs first and foremost. The combination of simple riffs with more-complicated solos, leads and guitar parts makes for a compelling listen. There’s also a slight Thrash Metal influence which means that Visions of Apocalypse has a lot to offer the listener.

The singer’s voice is somewhere between a scream and a growl, nailing down the feeling of Classic Death Metal in my mind.

This is a really satisfying album that I’ve enjoyed more than I expected to; a convincing display of Classic Death Metal in 2015 from a band who were around and active when it was all originally happening. In hindsight, how could this album be anything other than a victory?

Dissident – Unleash the Violence… In Thrash We Trust (Review)

Dissident are a Thrash Metal band from Chile. This is their début album.

This is riff-heavy Thrash Metal modelled on the Old-School style and dripping with the essence of the Bay Area scene from back in the day.

In many ways these songs are all about the guitars and what they get up to – not in some form of ultra-impressive technical insanity, but rather it’s all about the riffs and the feelings the evoke. I mean, how can you not want to just bang your head and fists when listening to this?

And they sound good too, production-wise; here we have a band that have a good recording from the off – everything balanced and nicely ripping. Solos and leads are bountiful, seemingly shredded out with ease. We mustn’t neglect the drums though – these are solid and do exactly what’s required of them.

After the love that the guitars and riffs get in all of the songwriting, it’s almost as if the vocals have been included merely for completion’s sake. They’re performed adequately in a style reminiscent of old, old Anthrax, and I think once the singer develops a little more force and charisma then they’ll really come into their own.

This album rips along nicely for 46 minutes and reminds the listener that some bands are still capable of Hellishly good Thrash riffs.

Check them out and see what you think.

Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/dissidentchile

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/dissident.chile