Band:	Overkill
Album:	White Devil Armory
Style:	Thrash metal
Release date:	July 18, 2014
A review by:	R'Vannith

01. XDM
02. Armorist
03. Down To The Bone
04. PIG
05. Bitter Pill
06. Where There's Smoke
07. Freedom Rings
08. Another Day To Die
09. King Of The Rat Bastards
10. It's All Yours
11. In The Name
12. The Fight Song [Deluxe edition bonus]
13. Miss Misery [Nazareth cover] [feat. Mark Tornillo] [Deluxe edition bonus]

Pyromania is a serious condition and suffice to say, Overkill know their way around a thrash flint. Within the modern state of the genre where there's smoke, there's a bunch of seniors laying waste to their youthful contemporaries with ridiculous ease and an undying delight for incineration. These veterans always go in blazing.

The Electric Age was staunchly consistent, its most obvious strength lying in its robust, albeit tightly uniform, song writing. White Devil Armory demonstrates that versatility is not lost to Overkill, offering a more varied track list than its predecessor and maintaining the same streak of excellence they've managed since Ironbound solidified the band's song writing processes for their own new age of thrash induced devastation. This all comes with carbon fibre quality in the riff writing and the kind of delivery that belies the band's near-antiquity. Letting loose with the memorable riff rolling of tracks like "PIG" shows a band not only still in the game, but still defining the rules of the game. Blitz needn't resign his pseudonym as he sounds as viciously vigorous as ever as the guitars follow their familiar lines with a familiar razor edge.

Thrash is typically repetitive by nature, but it's evident that there's more of an active consideration for track distinction here, certainly more-so than can be said of the previous record. Of course it'd be too much to expect anything near what could be described as "diverse" from Overkill, the band being clearly set in their ways, which proves yet again to be for the best. Yet their ways receive noticeable variation in White Devil Armory, being given more of an assorted arrangement as well as maintaining the thrash drawn bite which recent years have bewilderingly afforded them with such energy and drive. I'd bring up a particular cliché regarding wine and age here, but there really isn't the time for that given the usual high-octane performance from these old dogs. Thrash is serious business, and business is as good as ever for Overkill.

While this album often lacks the same power and propulsion of efforts like Ironbound, the guitars are no less hook prone in the soloing and prevailing in the rhythm section. With repetition essentially being thrash's stylistic guarantee the instrumentation can quite easily fall flat into the mundane, yet Overkill are always one step ahead and utilise the punchy repetitive riff basis as an effective platform for the leads and biting grit of vocal arrangements. It's obvious of White Devil Armory that the band actively attempted to withhold the repetitive nature of their arsenal, and merely fall back on a rehash of albums preceding this effort. Of course it's all still very much Overkill, which continues to equate to stability and relevance in an otherwise suffering genre.

Despite being album number seventeen for the American veterans, thrash these days rarely gets any fresher than what this record has in store. It's surely more quality Overkill and White Devil Armory is no deviation from their recently consistent strength in the studio.