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Bacteria13 Hatross Overlord
Joined: 30 Jan 2003 Posts: 2465
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Posted: Wed Jun 28, 2006 1:45 am Post subject: SODOM - s/t |
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Sodom - s/t
(SPV Records, 2006)
Hot on the heels of the excellent & essential Lords of Depravity Pt. 1 DVD comes the self-titled Sodom CD, album number 14, if you include the few mandatory live records, too. This album also celebrates the 10-years of band stability, with drummer Bobby Schottkowski and guitarist Bernemann managing to stick (re, not get fired) with main man/bassist/vocalist Tom Angelripper. If you have watched the fascinating band documentary on the DVD you will know why this is an accomplishment in itself!
Onto the album well, what can I say; it’s a Sodom album, plain and simple. This means that there are a couple of great tracks, few good tracks and lots of ok tracks – a pattern of unfortunate repetition for the German thrash legends. Opener ‘Blood On Your Lips’ dives straight into a crunching riff from a short acoustic intro, Angelripper’s distinctive voice (and, it must be said, embarrassing English lyrics – ‘The evil men are killing blindly’, anyone?) as coarse as sandpaper. ‘Wanted Dead’ is an old fashioned thrash belter with a great solo from Bernemann, and after two raise-your-fists-in-the-air tracks song number three, ‘Buried in the Justice Ground’ is …well, something of a Rock anthem. Placing this song here so early on in an album of 11-tracks seems redundant to me, especially as track number 4, ‘City of God’ is far more vicious. Still, that’s Sodom for you.
‘Bibles and Guns’ continues the blitzkrieg, whilst things slow down again with the mid-paced ‘Axis of Evil’. The title of their DVD, ‘Lords of Depravity’, makes an appearance in one of the fastest songs Sodom has ever recorded, and then things slow down once more with ‘No Captures’, this sounding exactly like ‘Axis of Evil’ or ‘Buried in the Justice Ground’. See what I mean? Stop-start-stop-start ... this record is not balanced by any means; perhaps in the future Sodom could record an album of two halves ala The Rolling Stones? ‘Lay Down the Law’ and ‘Nothing to Regret’ are both thrash-by-the-numbers, whilst album closer ‘The Enemy Inside’ is another mid-paced rocker and, well, there you go, another Sodom album.
End of the day – this is better than 2001’s M-16, but not as good as ‘99’s Code Red. Former guitarist Andy Brings had a hand in producing ‘Sodom’ and while the band is reportedly deliriously happy with the results it doesn’t sound particularly earth-shattering to these ears.
So, this is Sodom, 2006. And God help me, but I fucking love this band.
Bacteria13.
Blood On Your Lips:
http://www.yousendit.com/transfer.php?action=download&ufid=773BC7AF26E90DE9 |
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