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1.
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Anacrusis - Manic Impressions Demo
1990 - one o' my favourite recordings of all time. Great guitars, drums & vocal, brilliant lyrics - it's all there |
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2.
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Deadfall - Ordeal by Fire
2005 - fantastic slabs of Metallica-inspired thrash before they took a dip in the heavier, Slayer end of the pool ('Vicious Vendetta' was not quite to my taste). Anyway, 2 or 3 of the [long] tracks on here have gotta be the best British thrash I've ever heard, no doubt about it. (Deadfall formed from the collapse of Polaris, and a guitarist I like to keep an ear out for went on to Cynapse (http://www.myspace.com/cynapseband)) |
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3.
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Testament - Demo:1
1985 - wow. IMO Testament's usually a bit of a blah/meh band, but this early strike (four cuts, count 'em) with Steve Zetro (who moved on to Exodus, wooo!) is striking, stonking good thrash. Almost unbelievable, considering the changes that would follow... |
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4.
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Vektor - Demolition
2006 - c'mon, this is Vektor. You must know Vektor? |
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5.
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Ackros - Ackros
2005 - three more songs I find ever-so-hard to dislodge from my mind once they're in there. These experienced Belgians later changed their vocalist and released full-length debut 'The Multiverse' in 2008 with Serge Kasongo of Leng Tch'e notoriety |
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6.
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Altar - ...And God Created Satan To Blame For His Mistakes
1992 - may be a little derivative, but there's some awesome DM on here and their debut two years later, 'Youth against Christ' |
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7.
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Heathen - 2005 Demo
2005 - three great songs that made waves online as the first new breath in quite some time from the Bay Area thrash legend, later to appear on 2009's 'The Evolution of Chaos' |
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8.
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Forbidden - Demo '87
1987 - containing some of their best songs "Chalice of Blood" and "March into Fire", it would prove just another year's wait 'til their full-length potential was realized and released in 'Forbidden Evil', though their best was yet to come in both demo- and full-length form |
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9.
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Brutality - Metamorphosis
1991 - like Necro below (a year earlier) but a tad stronger, this is a lesser-known hit-out from Florida's DM scene with more catchy licks than a secluded, underground demon orgy, with greatly memorable vocal outbursts. "Mausoleum" a very nice preview of their 90s work |
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10.
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Argus - Demo 2007
2007 - really enjoyable doomy/heavy metal, I prefer these recordings to those of the same songs on self-titled debut 'Argus'. I've still got to look into what they produced after that... |
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11.
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Desilence - Antisilent
2003 - good German thrash with capable high and mid-range vocals. Absolutely speedy, wailing guitars, too, with sweet cover art detail that sadly was not seen on their debut in 2008 |
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12.
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Necro - Injustice's Inhuman Conditions demo
1990 - this is not rap... it may bear some resemblances, but this is a well-done, clear-cut death-metal demo. Admittedly, track durations are the easiest way for me to tell the three songs apart, but they're all jammed with tasty guitar-work, extremely tasteful drums and fairly perfect vo-killz. A shame (some would argue) the group never went anywhere |
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13.
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Wormed - Voxel Mitosis
2001 - one DM track that just [double-]kicks arse with inhuman vocals pretty much entirely undecipherable. Apparently this Spanish combo has lyrics about sci-fi or space, but the title probably refers to the cellular repair this guy known as Phlegeton needs after thrashing his vocal cords like so. My favourite part, though is probably the widely varied snare rhythms, nicely memorable |
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14.
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Bloodride - Taste Of Bloodride
2003 - my 2nd favourite tribe of thrashmen from Finland (not including Stone) started on a high note, and competently continued in consecutive years with the 'Bloodridden Disease' EP. 'III (Promo 2007)' was kind of a flop... oh well... Where's album #2, my fellow thrashing mentals? |
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15.
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Possessed - Death Metal
1984 - great American kickstarter to DM ahead of Slayer's more renowned and influential thrashing contributions. It wears a little thin nowadays, but back then... I can't begin to imagine |
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16.
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Cream - Those Were the Days [boxset; disc 2 of 4]
1997 - "Hey Now Princess" and "The Clearout" [demo] with that scream at the end are hidden classics that... perhaps don't need to be heard :P "You Make Me Feel" and "Weird of Hermiston", on the other hand... rare lyric-writin' prowess that slaps smiles on me, probably courtesy of poet Pete Brown. Also glad they brushed up a bit for the subsequent version of "Swlabr". Brilliant song, that (and proto-doom favourite (if I may) "We're Going Wrong") |
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17.
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Obituary - Metal Up Your Ass
1985 - nice early thrash under the Executioner name with rhymes to rival those of Cream above, not to mention the energetic drums, ripping guitars and... let's say enthusiastic vocals |
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18.
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Kivimetsän Druidi - The New Chapter
2007 - folky metal stuff from Finland. Quite alright, three decent songs, hmm ... no. It seems I often forget how much I like this when I'm actually listening to it. Indeed! K-Maa's a (good) new take on an older track, "Burden" sounds more than alright, and "The Tyrant" is almost as wildly strong and memorable as the other near-6-minuter they put out the year before |
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19.
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Asphyx - Promo '91
1991 |
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20.
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Abandoned - Forcefed
2000 |
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21.
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...Aaaarrghh... - ...aaaarrghh...
1999 - ...speaking of screaming, in blood-curdling fashion... this was my introduction to what some call "Darkthrone-clones" (orthodox black) in a conspicuous yet clandestine group based in Turkey. The album from 2006 (I dled these and all intervening material from the band's site) showed a capable band with character, putting out at least one good release worth more than the asking-price of nil. (Ruhlar Fisildiyor of 2004 held some variety, yet I only really dig tracks 5 & 8) |
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22.
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Ackros - Promo 2010
2010 - still fairly unorthodox Belgian DM, perhaps moreso than their earlier efforts |
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23.
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Space Eater - Ninja Assassin
2012 - speed-thrash from Serbia! Yeah! "Daisy Cutter" is far too catchy... check out the prior full-lengths if you haven't already, complete with nice artwork |
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24.
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Chaos Creation - Psyched-Out Manipulation
2006 - this's (IMO) the lesser of the Finnish CC's 4 demonstrations, though still a decent 20mins of thrash. Not quite at their usual level of character and catchiness. Don't tell me 'Final Warning' was really the end? |
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25.
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Separatus - Separatus
2005 - a nice 12 minutes of Metallica-derived heavy metal sung in the native tongue. Two songs; one decent, one average... then what..? :( |
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26.
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Altar - Altar
2007 - some epic use of samples (Passion o' t C, perhaps) and a few nice semi-melo dm riffs... great-ish atmosphere builds in "God Is a Lie", other than that not really too much to write home about, though. Their last gasp (for now) and barely a patch on the earlier, more ferocious material |
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27.
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Terror - Demo '94
1994 - so it turns out this was nothing to do with "Speed" Strid or Terror 2000 - I was likely lured to DLing this based on mention of it being a month-long side-project of the now-dead singer of Dissection... 3 songs in 5 minutes of kinda catchy/good but fairly throwaway extremetal that sounds like a whole lot of various death/grind/thrash "fun" projects thrown together just "for the love of it"... Just a touch more extreme, and perhaps more original than... |
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28.
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Chaosfear - Inside The Extreme World
2003 - more average-ish thrash here, this time out of Brazil. Enjoyable, but... thankfully they would develop more original riff-craft later |
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29.
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Vicious Art - ehh... never really got into this band, but I'm sure it'll give some Swe-deathrash fans their jollies due |
