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[Thorn]

Obituary - Slowly We Rot 9.5/10
The Daddy in the house this week is the Obi debut from 1989. The one band, the one vocalist, who can still cause my long suffering family to raise a fearful eyebrow when passing The Cave door. Some twonk gave this a 35/100 rating on the Archives recently. Seriously. 3.5/10. WTF. I'll go with oul Phil Alexander's words back in Raw Mag at the time...Pure Death Metal nirvana.

Life Of Agony - River Runs Red 9/10
I was never much into hard-core but then these guys were a lot more nuanced and interesting than yer Biohazards and Madballs. This was their masterpiece and still a unique and absorbing listen today.

Death Angel - The Dream Calls For Blood 8/10
Has any Of the vintage thrashers had a better latter day run of it than Death Angel? Is anyone else's voice holding up as well as Mark Osegueda?
We're due a new one too.Hopefully.

Accept - Russian Roulette 7/10
Fourth album from the mighty Germans but creative differences were starting to appear here resulting in a mixed bag of songs that sometimes veered a little too far into unacceptable Accept (It's Hard To Find A Way and Man Enough To Cry being the main culprits).

Warlock - Hellbound 7/10
Second album from the, er, mighty Germans (of the era), I'm not the biggest Doro fan to be honest and I find her vocals on here a bit too OTT at times but yeah, grand for a quick trip back to the Eighties, and boy does this reek of that (getting more and more) long lost decade.

Rotting Christ - Pro Xristou 6/10
Finally gave this some goes on YouTube this week more down to the algorithm constantly shoving it in my face than any particular desire to hear it . No surprises, band are still seemingly set on writing big dynamic movie soundtrack material, some Ridley Scott caper with gladiators and chariots and fuckloads of sand I imagine . Sounds like the same old rehashed motifs and melodies they've been churning out for a while now too me. Listenable but not even near the top ten of the To Purchase List.

[Carnage]

Re: The Obituary review mentioned above:

It's amazing the things you remember. The Metal Hammer review of Cause Of Death referred to the Circle Of The Tyrants cover that "puts neither band to shame". Not wrong either.

[Bürggermeister]

Fates Warning - Parallels & Theories of Flight

For some reason I stuck on about 20 seconds of Shit Magnetic before seeing sense and going back to Fates and Perfect Symmetry.

[Thorn]

Re: The Obituary review mentioned above:

It's amazing the things you remember. The Metal Hammer review of Cause Of Death referred to the Circle Of The Tyrants cover that "puts neither band to shame". Not wrong either.

Damn I miss magazines, I have plenty of the last decade but I'd love to get my hands on some of the real old ones from back in the day. Oh, and I edited that Nirvana to a lower case 'n', don't want any young bucks getting the completely wrong idea. Not that we have any young bucks here of course.

[Maggot Colony]

Death Angel - The Dream Calls For Blood 8/10
Has any Of the vintage thrashers had a better latter day run of it than Death Angel? Is anyone else's voice holding up as well as Mark Osegueda?
We're due a new one too.Hopefully.

Great album. The Evil Divide is a banger as well. Overkill come close in terms of quality releases, but Death Angel are the strongest of the old school thrash bands.

[Thorn]

Great call, shame on me forgetting about Overkill, good run of recent albums and Blitz's voice is holding up just as good.

[Ducky]

Going off the the back of BSC pointing out I would've had a brilliant trio of debuts spinning yesterday if I opted for When Dream and Day Unite over Awake, I've been all about WDaDU today. A banger

Always wondered how I&W would've sounded with Dominici at the mic instead of LaBrie.

[Black Shepherd Carnage]

Better 

[The Wretch]

Death Angel - The Dream Calls For Blood 8/10
Has any Of the vintage thrashers had a better latter day run of it than Death Angel? Is anyone else's voice holding up as well as Mark Osegueda? We're due a new one too.Hopefully.

Yeah, I read earlier that there are apparently a few issues there. If the problem is Osegueda touring with Kerry King, I would wonder if the paycheck is worth alienating his band, especially as they are making music infinitely better than King is. And lets be honest, better than latter day Slayer too. 

[Carnage]

The word betrayal was used, so I'm guessing that's the case. A shame if they broke down now, they've been great since they reformed.

[The Wretch]

Absolutely. Honestly, aside from the debut, which is easily one of my favourite albums of all time, I prefer their re-union albums to the earlier stuff.

[astfgyl]

Akercocke - Renaissance In Extremis.

This is getting better with time.

[Thorn]

Death Angel - The Dream Calls For Blood 8/10
Has any Of the vintage thrashers had a better latter day run of it than Death Angel? Is anyone else's voice holding up as well as Mark Osegueda? We're due a new one too.Hopefully.

Yeah, I read earlier that there are apparently a few issues there. If the problem is Osegueda touring with Kerry King, I would wonder if the paycheck is worth alienating his band, especially as they are making music infinitely better than King is. And lets be honest, better than latter day Slayer too. 

I didn't know King had nicked Oesgueda as I've been deliberately steering clear of that whole project, it's a shame if that were to impede new DA material but I suppose money will talk at the end of the day and I couldn't really blame the man for getting a few quid after a lifetime in the trenches.

[The Wretch]

Is he really going to be getting a massive payday though? It's not as if he joined Slayer.

And is it enough to rock the boat with his own band? And for a project that may not even have legs. And even if the KK band as it is lasts, how big will their profile be going forward?

It might be worth it in the short term for a decent cash injection, but long term, if it does mean the disbanding of Death Angel,  I don't think it is that wise. 

[Mr Barlow]

Morgoth - Cursed