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Gama Bomb - The Terror Tapes review




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Reviewer:
7.6

65 users:
7.71
Band: Gama Bomb
Album: The Terror Tapes
Release date: April 2013


01. The Wrong Stuff
02. Legend Of Speed
03. Backwards Bible
04. Beverly Hills Robocop
05. Smoke The Blow With Willem Dafoe
06. We Started The Fire
07. Terrorscope
08. The Cannibals Are In The Streets - All Flesh Must Be Eaten
09. Shitting Yourself To Live
10. Matrioshka Brain
11. Metal Idiot
12. Wrecking Ball

Gama Bomb's past couple discs never quite clicked for me. They sounded a bit like the kind of stuff I've got a sweet tooth for, but never really came together in a way that brought on the desired jitters and diabetes.

Ain't like that here, happy to say. This album is full of first-rate, amusing and exciting throwback thrash. These guys sound like respecters of Overkill now, not copycat worshippers, and they rock a Municipal Waste brand of ironic-ish bombast here. Good things.

The Terror Tapes is what its excellent album art suggests?basically, it's like watching some B-horror flick from the 80s. It's over-the-top, cheesy and fun. But unlike old B-horror movies, this ends before it gets too stale. (Can't say how many times I've gone to see or rented some funny looking, kitschy movie about killer elevators and/or brooms or something, laughed and had a good time, then about 30 minutes in gotten bored and itchy to bail.) It feels condensed, and in a good way. It's concise, there's no real drag.

If this album will be your introduction to Gama Bomb, all the better, in other words. This is high-octane shit from start to finish and has a nice tongue-in-cheek quality that's blatant enough, but never seems contrived. These guys know they're goofy and handle their goofiness with poise on this. Like goofy badasses. Their other discs ended up sounding stupid and stale more often than not. Not so here.

The only problem (I guess) is that none of this is really all that memorable. If there were fewer bands doing what these guys do, this would undoubtedly be a stand-out, but that's not the case. That said, it probably wasn't even the goal. This is the kind of album that's best enjoyed with a six pack of cheap beer and a bottle of a fine Surge vintage for the side?it'll be good to throw on every now and again, it's not one you'll have spinning nonstop for months to come (unlike Havok's Time Is Up with me, for instance, which I played the hell out of for months on end). It's good nonetheless. It's stupid, brash fun.


Rating breakdown
Performance: 8
Songwriting: 8
Originality: 5
Production: 7





Written on 22.06.2013 by Wormdrink's real name is George and he's an American.


Comments

Comments: 3   Visited by: 131 users
22.06.2013 - 19:45
Rating: 8
Rulatore

I thought that it was pretty amazing.
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22.06.2013 - 20:28
Lit.
Account deleted
Good enough for me. I'll check it.
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27.06.2013 - 05:31
psykometal
A staff guy...
I checked out the last album recently out of curiosity/while looking for some good thrash and did not particularly care for it. But this album is pretty fuckin' boss, good display of catchy, grooving thrash.
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