Label: From the Vaults
Release date: August 19, 2022
Rating: 8.5/10
A solid five years have passed since the last studio transmission from Slovenian thrashers Eruption. Cloaks of Oblivion is the album that, in my opinion, finally crowned the band as the standard-bearers of Slovenian thrash metal – a status they “inherited” from Negligence, who have sadly been inactive for quite a while now. The fact is, though, that with “Cloaks” the gals and guys did themselves a huge disservice and put themselves in a “make it or break it” situation. Following up on such a strong album and living up to it is no easy feat, and more bands have stumbled at it than pulled it off. On top of that, life isn’t a constant, and Eruption were no exception in the run-up to Tellurian Rupture. After a long stretch with an unchanged lineup, guitarist Andrej Čuk (Eldritch Anatomy, and his new band Ensanguinate, whose debut drops September 2 on Emanzipation Productions) left the group. Eruption found his replacement in Gregor Lavtar (Moshead), recorded the new thrash devastation Tellurian Rupture with him, and found a new home at Denmark’s From the Vaults (one of its heads is the guitarist of the cult Danish thrash institution Artillery, Michael Stützer).
Let’s start by dealing with the elephant in the room. Did Eruption manage to live up to the sky-high expectations? The answer is short and sweet. Yes! Tellurian Rupture has everything Cloaks of Oblivion had, and then some. Tellurian Rupture shows a high level of (musical) maturity, it’s more than “just” a thrash album, and it proves that Eruption’s well of ideas is far from drying up – if anything, the opposite, it erupts like a stratovolcano, and this fifty-minute-or-so record destroys everything in its path without mercy, like a pyroclastic flow.
The opener The Awakening already hints at that. Eruption don’t mess around: after half a minute of thunder they hurl you straight into a full-on storm of barrage riffs, and right from the start they serve up the very best the Eruption school has to offer – melodic vocals complemented by high falsetto screams, pyrotechnic guitars, and one of the most solid and reliable rhythm sections in the country. Even though Eruption mostly stick to their recipe of thrash metal seasoned with touches of American power metal, Tellurian Rupture sounds new, fresh, energetic, and devilishly effective. The whole crew deserves praise here, because they delivered at a truly high level. Klemen Kalin undoubtedly gives his by far best vocal performance on the album, and the way the verses of the apocalyptic concept are translated into vocal lines is downright astonishing, both effective and well thought out. On Tellurian Rupture Kalin has finally cemented his place as a vocalist – one who looks a lot to names like Russ Anderson, James Rivera, and Warrel Dane, yet still has a voice of his own that’s instantly recognizable. On top of that, Klemen is occasionally backed up by effective “gang” vocals that are never overdone, land in all the right spots, and lift the tracks even higher exactly where they need it.
Tellurian Rupture is just as strong on the instrumental side as it is on the vocal one. The rhythm section crushes like something caught between Scylla and Charybdis. Ivan “Tegla” Cepanec’s drums are varied and dynamic and make up the solid core of the whole record, with the clearly audible rattling and rumbling of Nika Krmelj’s bass added on top. She keeps breaking through to the surface, and her short bass “noodling” nicely spices up the space between the guitar riffs. Those riffs were the biggest unknown going in, or rather, the question was how new guitarist Gregor Lavtar would gel with Grega Kamenšek. The duo answers that question quickly, and if Gary Holt and Rick Hunolt were the “H-team” in Exodus, then with the other Gregor, Eruption got themselves a “G-team.” The guitar work on Tellurian Rupture is everything you could ask for from the guitars on a thrash album; the “G-team” repeatedly cuts loose in blistering solo excursions that wrap around your ears like tentacles, while Lavtar’s classic thrash background from Moshead gives the record even more aggression thanks to the “chugga chugga” and palm-muted riffs.
Tellurian Rupture is an angry, fast, and dark record that, between the lines of its apocalyptic sci-fi concept, makes it clear that humanity is a foreign body on Earth and will have only itself to blame for its own destruction. Along with its own, it will take the planet down too, but nature will survive the cleansing and go on to live a better life. The theme of destruction and rebirth seeps through ten tracks that range from thrash wreckers like Worms and Aegon’s Wrath, through the ballad-leaning Praise the Serpent Queen, to the ominous, epic closer with the title track, which plays out the album’s final moments with spoken word and acoustic guitars. Every track has its place and not a single one is superfluous, but the centerpiece of the album is probably one of the best moments in Eruption’s discography: the seven-and-a-half-minute epic Praise the Serpent Queen. With its countless twists and turns, it clearly shows the maturity of a band that breathes with the same lungs. At the same time, this mini-masterpiece, both musically and with its moving closing verse, is a wonderful tribute to “the best band that was destroyed by alcohol” and its sadly prematurely departed singer.
With Tellurian Rupture, Eruption prove that they are at the absolute peak of their creative powers right now and that they’ve developed their musical identity down to the last detail. It’s firmly rooted in classic thrash metal, but enriched by strong melodic and technically more complex approaches. Nothing we haven’t come to expect from Eruption, but they’ve never sounded this good before.
Tellurian Rupture comes out on August 19 on From the Vaults. You can order it at https://eruptionthrash.bandcamp.com or https://targetshop.dk, and it will be presented live on September 30, 2022 at Orto bar, alongside Sarcasm and Tytus.
Tracklist:
- The Awakening
- Worms
- Beyond the Black
- By Ignorance Obscured
- Coffin Bred
- Praise the Serpent Queen
- Gone With the Floods
- Aegon’s Wrath
- Maternal Foundry
- Tellurian Rapture
Lineup:
Klemen »Buco« Kalin – vocals
Ivan »Tegla« Cepanec – drums
Grega Kamenšek – guitar
Nika Krmelj – bass
Gregor Lavtar – guitar
