Label: Mascot Records
Release date: January 25, 2010 (European market) / January 31, 2020 (reissue for the 10th anniversary of the album)
Production: Juan Urteaga & Heathen
Album length: 68.28 min
Genre: (Bay Area) Thrash metal
Rating: 9.5/10
This January, the third studio album from Bay Area thrash metal scene legends Heathen got its reissue. For the occasion the album received a sound remaster and is now available, alongside the double vinyl and digital versions, as a CD with a bonus DVD. The DVD includes a two-hour documentary about the making of the album plus a live show from Japan in 2009! Worth adding that Heathen also played the famous Maribor club venue MC Pekarna on May 9, 2010. On top of the regular tracklist, the never-before-released instrumental Seasons Of Purgatory has now been added, which gratefully stretches the uncompromising, never-drying-up thrash metal shredding of this excellent album by another four and a half minutes on the reissued version.
Heathen – a band that joined the ranks of the most recognizable thrash metal bands at the birth of the Bay Area scene in the mid-eighties – are true sleepyheads. Their contemporaries from back then, after the revival of the movement heralded by the “Thrash Of The Titans” festival in 2001, had already put out comeback albums, starting with Exodus, then Death Angel and even Forbidden – a band that’s something like Heathen’s close stylistic thrash metal twin brother. Sadly, though, Forbidden called it quits again in the 10 years that have flown by in the blink of an eye since “Evolution of Chaos” came out.
Heathen’s albums “Breaking The Silence” and, right after it, “Victims Of Deception” count as classic thrash metal reading, and if an average metalhead who takes themselves seriously doesn’t know Heathen or both of those albums today, something must be seriously wrong. Even though the guys officially reunited at that very festival in 2001, quite a pile of years passed before they actually got a new studio album together. Exactly 19 years after its predecessor, “Victims Of Deception”.
No beating around the bush: this is an album we can instantly tag as the “Victims Of Deception of the 21st century.” That alone means “The Evolution Of Chaos” is one of the finest releases the metal scene gave us in 2010. If you trust what’s written above, then reading the rest of this review is totally unnecessary. Better to go grab your own copy of this excellent album right now.
In the extensive personnel rotation that went through the band from Heathen’s reunion until 2010, plenty of names could be spotted, but the core of the band – vocalist David White, guitarist Lee Altus and drummer Darren Minter – stayed stable throughout. Still, the stability needed to record an album only arrived with the addition of bassist Jon Torres (sadly no longer with us; Angel Witch, Laaz Rockit, Ulysses Syren) in 2004 and guitarist Kragen Lum (Prototype) in 2007. But we can’t stay totally indifferent here. In 2005 a demo came out with three brand-new songs: Dying Season, Arrows Of Agony and Empty Nothingness. Heathen kept all three for the new album, with Empty Nothingness sensibly retitled Silent Nothingness in line with how the song developed further.
It’s true that Heathen are synonymous with sheer laziness when it comes to putting out studio albums, but on the flip side the rule fully applies that whatever they do manage to release hits masterpiece level, and “The Evolution Of Chaos” is no exception whatsoever.
Lee Altus is the main songwriter, and the chemistry between him and Lum works flawlessly. That’s why Heathen have held on to that recognizable character of technical-progressive polish, offering a distinctive and unique combination of motif-rich, technically demanding songs and unbridled showers of toxic napalm aggression from never-ending thrash metal wrath. The best thing thrash metal can actually offer. Not only did we get 10 new songs with the authentic definition of that markedly recognizable Bay Area riff guidance, with a clear expressive disjunction between the parts that breathes a chiseled thrash metal character into every single track, but the Altus/Lum tandem is a true driving engine that, with the relentless energy of tightly phrased picking, stuns above all with the brilliance of its solo excursions. With the available space carefully seasoned with ornaments of twin guitar harmonies in thirds, the two guitarists at times seem trapped in a time machine, as the weaving and trading of multi-part solos between them just doesn’t seem to end. They create that top-notch ambient in the six-minute instrumental closing section of the album, the 11-plus-minute mini-epic No Stone Unturned. That the solo excursions carry equal weight on this album as the phrasing, and as David White’s vocal delivery too, Heathen announce already with the intro itself, as well as with the opening motif of Dying Season. If you’re a fan of endless guitar wizardry and breakneck solos that never seem to end and that suddenly stun you with a combo of speed, precision and constant creative insight, then this is an album you’ll love right away, no questions asked. Heathen belong to the Bay Area movement. They stay true to their roots.
David White remains a vocalist with an exceptional range. He sounds determined, relentless in the verses, with a hint of disillusionment in his voice, while a plasma-like “wrath” in the verses remains another name for White. His polished “head voice” approach blends brilliantly with touches of gruffness. In fact, White is far more convincing, even more varied in stringing together emotions, than on the first two Heathen albums. More mature.
This album also features guest spots from some interesting musicians. It’s actually no surprise that Altus’s Exodus colleagues Gary Holt (shared solo in Control By Chaos) and vocalist Rob Dukes (in A Hero’s Welcome) ended up on it. The band didn’t forget guitarist Terry Lauderdale either – they gave the former member room for a solo in Arrows Of Agony. The most interesting name among the guests, though, this time goes to the bass role. That’s Steve DiGiorgio (Death, Sadus,…) on “fretless” bass, whose signature playing further deepens the highly vibrant shifts of mood in the epic No Stone Unturned.
The only mild miss on “The Evolution Of Chaos” is the inclusion of the predictable and riff-wise trivial A Hero’s Welcome. Heathen are (only) Americans after all, so some of you may suffer a sugar rush when you run into this song’s lyrics in particular. Dumb patriotism, the kind you just can’t dodge when you run into Uncle Sam. Anyway. Even on this track the band proves its exceptional technical polish, and it wins with a poker hand of aces again in the instrumental section, thanks to another bravura moment from the untamed Altus/Lum guitar duo.
The album is hellishly wound up, as thrash metal demands, and at the same time, thanks to its technical polish, it appeals to music gourmets too, as it combines the outstanding partnership of the quintet that created it. In the production it sounds toxically alive, as if Heathen were playing a gig in the studio. This album already stood out 10 years ago in the sea of current releases on the metal scene, mainly because every single song has a clearly built character, based on Heathen’s embodied skill for setting chiseled, incisive guitar phrases, which the band tops with highly compatible arrangement seasoning of its own distinct character.
You can feel that the ideas came about years apart, which is why their character is all the more defined and standout. “The Evolution Of Chaos” is an album that won’t let you breathe and will captivate you with its authenticity and uniqueness. Even after 10 years it’s worth stressing that once you hit “play”, you’ll have a hard time ever coaxing this album out of your CD player! It was worth the wait of a whole 19 years. And the best part is that at the start of this September Heathen are finally releasing its successor too, to be called “Empire of the Blind”. Meanwhile, we can sharpen our teeth on this evergreen.
Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Track list:
1. Intro (1:21)
2. Dying Season (5:41)
3. Control by Chaos (7:09)
4. No Stone Unturned (11:10)
5. Arrows of Agony (6:40)
6. Fade Away (5:45)
7. A Hero’s Welcome (6:52)
8. Undone (6:42)
9. Bloodkult (4:31)
10. Red Tears of Disgrace (5:52)
11. Silent Nothingness (6:51)
Lineup:
David White – vocals
Lee Altus – guitar
Kragen Lum – guitar
Jon Torres – bass guitar, backing vocals
Darren Minter – drums, backing vocals
Guest musicians:
Steve DiGiorgio – “fretless” bass on “No Stone Unturned”, sitar on “Intro”
Jon Allen – percussion and bells on “Intro”, backing vocals
Gary Holt – guitar solo on “Control by Chaos”
Terry Lauderdale – guitar solo on “Arrows of Agony” and “Silent Nothingness”, backing vocals
Adam Harrington – narration on “A Hero’s Welcome”, backing vocals
Juan Urteaga – backing vocals
Rob Dukes – backing vocals
Dean Bardwell – backing vocals
Tambre Bryant – backing vocals
Alina “Squeak” Hernes – backing vocals
