siLLy puPPy Formed in the tiny little town of Hayfork in the extreme remote region of Trinity County in Northern California, SOULS TORN emerged some time in the mid-2000s and released the demo “Black Chapter” in 2006 but took another four years to finally put out the band’s so far only album titled FLESH EATERS which came out in 2011.

Virtually nothing can be found about this band except that the members are / were Marcus Connor (bass), Jeremy Stanley (drums), Mitchell Connor (guitar), Jason Stanley (guitar) and Ross Sciarra (vocals). Remaining an independent and unsigned band, this homegrown product exhibits an excellent approach to deathened thrash metal however the production job is a little on the awful side.

FLESH EATERS features ten tracks that slink over the 54 minute mark and what SOULS TORN proves best of all is that they are a bunch of capable musicians delivering an authentic retro slice of old school thrash metal with death metal embellishments. In other words, the riffs and compositions are more rooted in thrash riffing, stop / start stomps and conjure up elements of Metallica, Exodus, Sepultura and other more melodic thrash metal bands. The death metal aspects include a grittier vocal style not quite in the guttural growl range but getting there. There are also some blastbeats and darker death metal deviations from thrash.

Probably closer to death / thrash hybrids like Demolition Hammer, Kreator or Morbid Saint, SOULS TORN truly could’ve been one of the big players if only they had emerged at least 25 years prior. Creativity is not this band’s strong point as there is nothing here to really bring thrash metal into the 21st century but for a retro thrash experience, this is some seriously excellent music to descend into.

Having only listened to this on YouTube, i’m not sure if it’s the upload or the actual production but it’s very lo-fi and fairly bad but given the death metal elements, it’s actually not too bad because i really don’t mind extreme metal with a raw nasty DIY crusty outer coating. It all does sound a bit thin though and even my tolerance has a hard time with this one but since i’m not sure if it’s the upload or the album i can’t really judge it on that basis. Needless to say, if this is the actual production it needs a serious remastering.

There’s not much more to say about SOULS TORN’s sole album FLESH EATERS except that they did their homework well and dish out a stellar collection of high octane deathened thrash metal performances with fiery energetic deliveries and excellent musicianship. Even the vocals sort of have that Vektor gut vomit sound. Not bad for a band that emerged from the middle of the forested coastal range of bumfuck California. This is some impressive chops going on here and probably was / is an excellent band to catch in a live performance.