Assailant-Review in MetalCrypt
Assailant-Review in MetalCrypt
Rating: 4,25/5; Autor: Luxi Lathinen
Costa Rican thrashers Assailant know how to make blood boil and cause severe neck injuries. I mean, they do know how to burst their testosterone channels fully open to create intense and mean Thrash Metal. That's exactly what they did on their self-titled 5-track demo back in 2012.
Without the help of many small underground Metal labels like Ragnarök Records, many of these 'hidden gems' would remain secrets of the underground metal scene forever unless somebody did some groundwork to dig them up. Now Assailant's 5-song demo comes with an extended booklet and four bonus tracks, two of which are live tracks and the other two are instrumentals.
As for the music, Assailant count on an approach similar to what bands from the Bay Area Thrash Metal scene did back in the early 80s: A wall of big, aggressive, and technical riffs that come from every direction, a strong yet shamelessly farting bass sound, well-executed solos and gang-shouted chorus parts accompanied with hostile sounding main vocals parts. This same recipe has worked for Assailant. To me, they sound like a cross between Vio-lence and Las Vegas-based The Horde of Torment, spiced with a similar spitting vocal style that Tom Araya used to do in his early days. Sounds tempting, doesn't it?
The demo part is, of course, the absolute highlight of this re-release: the band's Thrash Metal is very hard to resist by any serious fan of the genre, especially if you have a soft spot for Bay Area-tinged Thrash. The two live tracks are unfortunately low quality, which makes you wonder why they were accepted as a part of this release in the first place. On the other hand, I do understand why the two rehearsal instrumental tracks both found their way onto this release: they both sound absolutely killer, ripping your ears off by sheer power that's been loaded behind both of them.
In summa summarum, Assailant's demo re-release is definitely worth picking up.
4,25/5
Link to review in Metal Crypt.com
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