Released By: SELF RELEASED OUT NOW!!
Style: Thrash Metal
Links: http://www.myspace.com/steelgarthrash
Tracklist:
1 .Injected**
2 .Retaliator
3 .Portrait In Blood
4 .Riders Of The Sand
5 .Promontory
6 .Hunter On Prowl**
7 .Under The Whip**
8 .Napalm Burn
9 .Thrashing Knights
10 .Army Of Goats**
Spanish band STEELGAR formed in 2006 to create music that paid tribute to their influences and write the kind of songs that they themselves would like to listen to. The main attribution comes in the form of 80’s inspired Thrash Metal made famous by bands like METALLICA, MEGADETH, EXODUS and TESTAMENT, but there is also a bit of influence from some older Power Metal and also a touch of DIO inspired Traditional Metal.
The good thing about knowing this before listening to the album is that you can go into it without expecting to be blown away by something original and fresh. What you can expect though, is well-executed 80’s inspired Thrash Metal album that is a true tribute to an era before metal got itself so overwrought with genres and labels, and was just called METAL!!!
I really enjoyed the vocal approach taken by HECTOR AMAYA, and on the album his voice reminded me a bit of TOM ARAYA but a little more high-pitched and scratchy. I don’t mean scratchy in a bad way, quite the contrary actually, the higher pitched vocals really suit the speed metal part of the band and when combined with some awesome classic Thrash riffs the picture is truly complete. There are a few songs on the album that suffer a little from some straightforward, simplistic riffing, but all-out Thrash assaults like INJECTED, HUNTER ON PROWL and ARMY OF GOATS more than make up for it. A couple of the slower groove tracks work pretty well, for example UNDER THE WHIP which really makes use of the bands habit to slow the tempo right down and chug away.
XENOCIDE is another fine Thrash metal slab for 2010 that can sit comfortable next to similar albums released this year from BATTALION, METAL REQIUEM, HEATHEN and WICCA, and is easily recommendable to anybody that likes their metal real and their thrash old-school.
Written by Zeezee
Ratings Zeezee 8/10
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