Evile-Enter the grave

Earache
2007

The year 1986 was such a great year for speed metal and Metallica's Master of puppets and Slayer's Reign in blood were a huge part of that. Not only did those two album raise every one's awareness of speed metal, but they also caused a lot of young bands to try emulate their styles. So for the next 2-3 years there were still young guys coming out of the woodwork trying to be the next Metallica or Slayer. Fast forward twenty some years later and some up and coming bands are still being influenced by those two classic albums. Such is the case for UK based Evile. It doesn't take long to realize the impression that 1980's thrash had on these guys. They obviously spent plenty of time studying Slayer, Metallica, Exodus and a few others. They have the basics down overall with some solid riffs plus decent production provided by former Metallica producer Flemming Rasmussen. Yet like many of the bands that tried to copy the masters in the late 1980's they are missing a few essentials that keep them from being a first rate thrash band. The obvious one is an overall lack of aggression in the music and the vocals. You can go through the paces, but you really have to put some real anger or fire behind it and these guys sound too often like they are on auto-pilot. The other problem is related to the first and that is the music lacks a sharpness in the pace changes. If you think of the top thrash bands of the day then you pictures the sharp, pounding pace changes that make the songs by those bands stand out. These guys hit it some, but they need to be far more consistent if they want to get noticed. As someone who went over almost every thrash band that came down the pike in the late 80's I can appreciate the idea of trying to bring 1980's thrash back. However this bands needs some more work before they can really make an impact or be a major player in any kind of thrash comeback. There is some potential here and I hope they keep plugging away, but overall they sound like the many bands who tried and failed to be thrash masters back in the late 1980's.

You can check them out at Myspace below.
Myspace