Self-produced
2008
Hailing from Canton, Ohio Mortifier are yet another young group trying to revive old-style thrash metal. It seems like this genre is more and more crowded each month. That's great if you are a fan. However, just like twenty years ago once the thrash market got flooded it's difficult for a band to get noticed when many of them sounder very similar. So what we have on this offering are eight tracks all largely founded in the earlier years of thrash say around 84-86. I hear Slayer, Kreator, Sodom, early Metallica and even "Killing is my business" era Megadeth. It took a few songs for them to really warm up as both the opener "Mountain killings" and the second track "Dead by dawn" seem to lack firepower. The heaviness is sort of there, but everthing is more routnine than I was hoping for. Although at least part of this may be a production shortcoming. The guitar is a little low in the mix at times. Particularly when the drums pick up the guitar seems to fade into the background more than it needs to. However the band pick up the pace considerably on "Black Plague" and even more so on "Viking Rampage". They settle in and the energy level goes up a notch. Plus they take a few chances and mix up the pace. On some the later songs the guitar has a raw, primal sound that reminds some of demos from the mid-80's. I feel like the potential is there and they certainly got better as the album went along. However there is no doubt they could be a little tighter at times and taking some more risks would help. They differ some from other bands coming up because the sound is a less polished and their influences vary a little more, but they need to keep working at it to really leave the kind of impression I am sure they want to make.
http://www.myspace.com/mortifier1
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