Artist: Terror
Label: Century Media
Release: 2008
Rating: 3/5
Terror, the embodiment of hardcore misanthropy from the City of Angels (Los(t) Angeles), are running wild and untamed. There’s not a year without a studio album from them. And not a year without a proper devil’s fist of a record, bursting at the seams with hatred, rage and agony.
The new album “The Damned, The Shamed” also follows the band’s well-tested old school hardcore formula, leaning on good old Agnostic Front, with traces of Cro-Mags, Madball and Sick Of It All here and there. The main target and generator of all that energy is of course vocalist Scott Vogel, the embodiment of the most malevolently authentic hardcore vocals a band could wish for. The choruses are fire spat straight in your face, backed by the trademark gang shouts that are a must in the genre waters the band swims in.
Terror are full of atrocities in the lyrics, biting relentlessly and waging a real war for a solid half hour, pieced together mostly from two-minute songs. In the riffs they make no attempt to hide their flirtation with the thrash metal legacy (Slayer, Pantera). Once again we’re dealing with the band’s noble tightness. Rock-solid riffs, expertly forged and built into the venomous undercarriage of a rhythm section that slaps you around the ears without a shred of mercy from start to finish.
Maybe the only thing that bugs me a little is that this is already the band’s fifth record in four years, so that feeling of fullness while listening, the kind albums like ”One With The Underdogs” (2004, the band’s debut) or the one after it, “Lowest Of The Low” (2005), managed to conjure up, just doesn’t come alive as strongly anymore. Still, Terror know exactly how to shackle the listener in their chains when they commit a few of their most original sins, e.g. in the song What I Despise, a maximally possessed hardcore speed storm and an excellent headbanging anthem that really grows live. The album is still wildly diverse though, as the complete turnaround in dynamics in March Of Redemption after the excellent, classic hardcore-style stampede Lost Our Minds confirms.
The album doesn’t hide its quality. The songs carry the band’s typical essence, yet manage to string together a nice dose of mood variety, thanks to the band’s still-present songwriting inspiration. With the new album Terror once again prove they’re a tight unit you can always bet the ace of spades on. The production keeps a good measure of liveliness in this incinerating hardcore glow. The sonic contrast between the massive riff machine-gunning and the rhythm section rolling through the whole record is outstanding. So here’s yet another very good Terror album, and the guys prove that few can stand up to them in their boxing ring.
Lineup
Scott Vogel – vocals
Doug Weber – guitar
Martin Stewart – guitar
Jonathan Buske – bass
Nick Jett – drums
Production
Zeuss
Tracklist
01. Voice Of The Damned
02. Relentless Through And Through
03. Betrayer
04. Rise Of The Poisoned Youth
05. Never Alone
06. What I Despise
07. Let Me Sink
08. Feel The Pain
09. Lost Our Minds
10. March To Redemption
11. Crush What’s Weak
12. Still Believe?
13. Suffer, To Return Harder
Album runtime: 30.52
