DESTRUCTOR — Decibel Casualties (review)

DESTRUCTOR — Decibel Casualties album cover

Album · 2017 · Speed Metal

5/5 · 2017-07-01
Vim Fuego

The Life and Death of Julius Caesar Act 2, Scene 1

TREBONIUS: There is no fear in him; let him not die; For he will live, and laugh at this hereafter.

Clock strikes

BRUTUS: Peace! count the clock.

CASSIUS: The clock hath stricken three.

TREBONIUS: 'Tis time to part.

CASSIUS:…

TREBONIUS: I said, “’Tis time to part!”

CASSIUS:…

BRUTUS: Cassius, thou crusty botch of nature, he said “’Tis time to part!”

CASSIUS:…

BRUTUS & TREBONIUS (Shouting): Cassius!

CASSIUS (Removes something from his ears, a little surprised) : What?

BRUTUS: He said “’Tis time to part!”

CASSIUS (Angry): Thou cullionly rump-fed hedge-pigs! I was listening to Destructor on my iPod! Go yourselves, give unto Caesar that which is his, a ruddy great knife right in the squishy bits! I’m busy enjoying my anachronisms!

Cassius reinserts his earphones and walks away, gently banging his head and playing air guitar… _____________________________________________________

Apologies to the long since departed Mr Shakespeare, but he was quite fond of the odd anachronism, this being his most famous. For anyone who hasn’t quite figured it out yet, an anachronism is something which is not just out of place, but also out of time. Like Shakespeare’s infamous clock, Destructor is a band out of their correct time, and long may it stay that way.

Showing a lot of promise, Destructor’s 1985 debut album ‘Maximum Destruction’ was a tour de force of hard-hitting, gnarly mid-80s thrash. Unfortunately, circumstances conspired against the band. Bass player Dave Holocaust (real name Dave Iannicca) was murdered, and the band was passed over by the ever-clueless Island Records. Destructor seemed doomed. Founding members Pat Rabid and Dave Overkill kept things going as long as possible, but the shifting musical climate meant an incomplete second album stayed unfinished, and Destructor finally split in 1992.

For many years, ‘Maximum Destruction’ was one of those much beloved footnotes in history, which long time metalheads delight in pointing out to those who missed out, usually with the comment “they don’t make metal like this any more”. Well, now they do.

Luckily for us, Destructor reunited in 1999. German magazine Snake Pit interviewed Dave Overkill, and Overkill realised there was still interest in the band. Destructor was resurrected, and has been performing and recording ever since.

‘Decibel Casualties’ is Destructor’s fourth studio album. Showing a glorious and blatant disregard for fashion and the passage of decades, little has changed in the Destructor camp since the heady days of 1985. The studs and chains are a little rusty, but the band members still have goofy pseudonyms, and the music is still magnificently metallic. However, a few things have changed around Destructor. Production techniques and technology have advanced infinitely since 1985. Back then, the sound of metal albums often sounded shrill and brittle, or were swamped and muffled. No longer. ‘Decibel Casualties’ is razor sharp and crystal clear.

Destructor still performs exactly what thrash fans loved about the band in the first place- thrash metal. This might sound like stating the painfully obvious, but it is true. Where bands like Municipal Waste, Toxic Holocaust, and Gama Bomb have tried hard to recreate that old school spirit, Destructor ooze it from every pore. Take almost any track from the album, like “Keep the Faith” as an example, and you will find that driving “quicker-than-it-seems” rhythm, powered by massive riffs and double kick-drum devastation, overlaid with lead guitar duels and Dave Overkill’s raspy yet melodic vocals. It is not of this time, but feels timeless. It is what teenage thrash metal fans fell in love with three decades ago.

And that is basically the formula for the whole album, and Destructor’s whole career. Any attempt at probing for a deeper meaning to this music is futile. Take it at face value, because that is all there is to it. These are songs by metalheads, written for metalheads, about metal. If you don’t get it, you aren’t supposed to.

If this sounds like it will have you banging your balding head, raising your arthritic horns, and pulling muscles rather than riffs from your air guitar, then you too are a decibel casualty. Old school thrash metal does not need to be an anachronism or a nostalgia trip.

In Destructor, the old school is still here.

more than 2 years ago
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more than 2 years ago

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