Ελληνικά
Genre: Speed/Thrash
Country: Greece
Label: Eat Metal Records
Year: 2017
As a friend said, I am -probably- tediously morose. It’s reasonable for me to be thought of like that because I don’t care about social relationships, especially when it comes to music, which is now used for self-promotion and upgrade. I prefer to just say my opinion and revolve around people regardless of them listening to metal, reading the magazine or having a band etc… That’s why I don’t look at the line-up of a band before I write a review, since obviously I might have a good relationship with some of the people in it. Demolition Train, two years after a very good debut -that I expected to have a better feedback in the audience and the evolution of the band-, return with Bound by Horror, Sealed by Blood. Of course you can’t leave the excellent cover uncommented, one of the best I have seen the five years in general created by Dimitar Nikolov (a personal preference I have for cinema 50’s-60’s posters, where the cover of the record is based on), it’s kind of misleading and would fit more to an N.W.O.B.H.M. album than speed / thrash. Musically, speed is above all here creating the environment and the merits of the act. We’re not talking about nonsense speedjamming. The instruments are distinct and each one has its role. The guitars are influenced by traditional heavy metal with many N.W.O.B.H.M. sides (most characteristics are the huge track Blood on Satan’s Claw and Witchkiller), while not missing the rawness in the vein of teunotic thrash that the Greek scene loves so much (the audience and the bands). The production is not crystal (why should it be?) but it is clean, leaving the dirtiness needed (by Nikos Papakostas at Entasis Studios). There are a lot of artistic elements besides the casual “we thrash out and drink beers”, not as a hipster addition but of a way to show people with a variety of musical taste and quality able to transform that into creation and inspiration (firstly with the introduction of The Night of the Wurdulak and the magical ending of Nocturnal Rite). The main musical volume is based on clear speed / thrash of early Metallica, Sodom, Tankard and slightly Slayerish riff textures. The banding isn’t missing and Nir Beer of Speedrush participates in Beast of Hades, and Dimitris Kartaloglou of Sacral Rage to Wendigo Screams. Needs a grading? If we insist on stuff like that, ok….
4/6
