Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Artist: Havok
Label: Century Media
Release: 2017
Runtime: 57:23
Rating: 4/5
Havok are an American thrash metal band from Denver (Colorado). Besides playing Ljubljana on 04/20/2017, they count as revivalists and belong to the upper-tier young-generation thrash metal bands, developing an incredible technical polish and compositional-performance complexity. After thirteen years of existence, the band has hatched a new studio album this year, »Conformicide«. The fourth studio album keeps up the merciless, barbaric stance of pure-blooded riding on the best of the old-school thrash metal treasure chest, and you can pick out quite a bit of inspiration from the Bay Area thrash legacy (though not!!! everything here is just thrash metal), all the while keeping in mind that through all of it Havok still manage to develop a sound all their own.
Almost an hour of incredibly driven songwriting, where the band develops incredible technical mastery, ultrasonic speed and equally precise execution, which after an album like »Time’s Up« (2011) is practically expected of Havok by now. What’s new is that for »Conformicide« the band moved from Candlelight Records to Century Media. That says it all. An excellent new bassist, Nick Schendzielos of Job For A Cowboy, also joined the band for the new album.
The lineup still includes original founding member, vocalist and guitarist David Sanchez. He’s the essential figure in Havok, the one the band’s musical vision stands and falls on, and he holds the reins of the band’s musical direction firmly in his hands. David has a deadly venomous voice, especially when he’s royally pissed off. In his screaming he easily taps into the energetic vibes that Tom Araya (Slayer) built long ago at his vocal peak, while the color of his high-reaching, screeching voice occasionally pulls toward Death Angel vocalist Mark Osegueda.
On top of the inspired and consequently piercing, hard-hitting guitar phrases, which now and then evoke lessons learned from good old Dave Mustaine, the predatory chemistry the quartet builds, and a nobly red-hot »live« production, there’s a technical upgrade with breakneck passages, powered by soloing acrobatics, defined intros and outros, and a few stylistic finesses borrowed from the classic Bay Area days, like the use of »gang-scream« vocals, at moments getting close to the perfectionism of Exodus and Testament. But there’s more. If you’re a fan of rigid thrash metal forms that develop technical complexity in their vision, you’ll adopt Havok, who are officially considered revivalists, in no time and maybe add them to your collection of albums of »absolute untouchability«, which belong to the most prominent bands of the thrash metal world. The band can also deliver longer compositions that never get boring, like Ingsoc and, later on the album, Circling the Drain, where a lot happens and where not even passages that pull toward death metal-style song formatting are left out (the closing part of Circling the Drain). The two bonus tracks on the special edition of this CD show that the band can, in its dirtiness, boil over into something bizarrely minimalist and get close to bare punk rock thrashing, as in the under-a-minute String Break. The other bonus track also departs from the rest of the album: the closing Slaughtered, which sounds modern and once again draws on death metal’s genre levers.
Havok are socially critical, and Sanchez doesn’t hold back with his wildness and the snake venom he spits mercilessly all over the album. The band rewards the listener throughout with many finesses built into the form of the basic motifs, with incredible skill and compositional inspiration. I’m aiming especially at the highly dynamic rhythm section. The rattling, piercing, hypermelodic bass and the jerky weaving in of all kinds of transitional drum passages, where the combination of double bass drum pedals and hyperactive rolls on the tom toms is a real treat of the album and a chapter of its own in the listening.
»Conformicide« is an incredibly convincing album in filigree packaging: razor-sharp, piercing thrash metal revivalism. With it, Havok confirm their maturing as songwriters and live up to the sky-high praise they got for their previous albums. As such, »Conformicide« cements Havok’s position on the metal scene, and thanks to the heart and commitment on show, it opens new doors for them to break upward and win over the hearts of a new guard of metalheads.
What’s left for the finale? A must-visit to Orto Bar on Thursday, 04/20/2017, when Havok play alongside three more excellent bands: Warbringer, Gorod and Exmortus.
Havok – “Intention to Deceive”:
Lineup
David Sanchez – vocals, guitar
Reece Scruggs – guitar, backing vocals
Nick Schendzielos – bass guitar
Pete Webber – drums
GUESTS:
John Hernandez – additional screaming
Tim Ryan – intro speech on track no. 4
Production
Steve Evetts
Track list
1. F.P.C.
2. Hang ‘Em High
3. Dogmaniacal
4. Intention To Deceive
5. Ingsoc
6. Masterplan
7. Peace Is In Pieces
8. Claiming Certainty
9. Wake Up
10. Circling The Drain
12. String Break*
13. Slaughtered*
*…bonus tracks on the special edition of the album
