Reviews written by: Dave Ingram Jr.

Reviews

Virus - A New Strain Of An Old Disease

Virus were one of the first thrash metal bands I ever heard. I received a cassette copy of their 1989 album Lunacy when I was a young'un (yeah, CASSETTE) and bloody loved it, as as time went on I found myself loving their post-reunion output and sharing the stage with them a great many times. The release of 2009's Raped By Mutants EP was a strong i...

30/11/2013

Trauma - Scratch And Scream (reissue)

Bloody hell, this is a band that you don't hear about very often! Those who have done their homework might remember Trauma as the band that once had the now-legendary bassist Cliff Burton amongst their ranks before he went on to join some other band... what was their name again? The band released the track 'Such A Shame' on the Metal Massacre II co...

09/11/2013

State Of Negation - District Unknown

I thoroughly enjoyed State Of Negation's Project Payback EP when I reviewed it earlier this year. Despite sounding like something that a clueless 14 year old Metal Hammer reader would spunk his shorts over, it was a genuinely enjoyable and honest slice of the modern groove-metalcore pie that I've oddly found myself listening to quite a lot recently...

31/10/2013

Toranaga - Righteous Retribution

Thrash metal reunions seem to be the 'in thing' nowadays. Over the past decade we've seen reformations from Onslaught, Sabbat, Coroner, Toxik, Anihilated, Blood Feast, Exhorder, Virus and a fair few more who probably aren't worth mentioning, but one of the more surprising comebacks was Toranaga. Lumped into the same boat as fellow Brits Anihilated,...

30/10/2013

Down Among The Dead Men - Down Among The Dead Men

Down Among the Dead Men is a band that I've been keeping very close tabs on since it's unveiling earlier this year. Collaborations between fantastic death metal musicians are more common than stupid outbursts from Dave Mustaine, but they mostly come across as rather lackluster efforts that rely solely on the names involved than the actual quality o...

22/10/2013

Bonesaw - The Illicit Revue

Death metal bands are a pound to a pinch of shit these days. We're flooded with them - some are brutal, some are technical, some are doomy, some are punkish, some are old school and others are just plain rubbish so I was pleasently surprised to find that Bonesaw's newest release is a nice mixture of all of them. Except for the last one... honest....

19/10/2013

Anihilated - iDeviant

Anihilated are one of those UK thrash bands from the eighties that many seemed to overlook - everyone's attention tends to be focused on the likes of Onslaught, Sabbat, Virus, Lawnmower Deth and Xentrix, ignoring bands such as Anihilated (amongst others) who deserved a hell of a lot more credit than they got. Their first two albums, Created In Hate...

01/10/2013

Monolith - Tales Of The Macabre

Every now and then, I tend to get bored and spend a day scouring the depths of the internet in search of something new... or old. Something, anything that'll pique my curiosity. And in doing so recently I came across a death metal band called Monolith from the UK, a band who started out in 1990 under the name Catalepsy, released the Faces of Death...

12/09/2013

Kemakil - Kemakil

Kemakil are one of the few, if not the only unsigned UK thrash band around nowadays who were actually doing the rounds back in the eighties. They initially formed in 1988 before disbanding two years later, then reformed again in 2008 and have been doing the rounds ever since while releasing a plethora of demos and EPs along the way. Hell, I've play...

10/09/2013

Protector - Reanimated Homunculus

Protector are one of my favourite German bands. Ever. I always thought that they should have been given more recognition for their works, with albums such as Golem and the incredible A Shedding of Skin being amongst my favourite death-thrash releases of all time so imagine my surprise when a Protector reunion was announced alongside a four track de...

10/09/2013

Pure Negative - Insert [Twist] Pull

This one came somewhat out of the blue, as Pure Negative are a band that can only be described as technical progressive death-thrash... yeah, try saying that three times really fast. It's definitely a pool for talent, boasting members of Dripback, Affluenza, Labrat and Damnas in the band's ranks so obviously my expectations are rather high. Enter I...

10/09/2013

Exxxekutioner - Exxxekutioner

This'll be an extremely short, precise review. I'm all tuckered out after the week I've had... recovering from the new Annihilator, Onslaught and Warlord UK albums takes time. Manchester's Exxxekutioner, besides having the most awkward-to-type band name on earth, are a bunch of fresh-faced thrash metal upstarts who blatently love their 80's soun...

07/09/2013