EXODUS — Persona Non Grata (review)

EXODUS — Persona Non Grata album cover Album · 2021 · Thrash Metal Buy this album from MMA partners
3.5/5 ·
Kev Rowland
It took me a long time to get into Exodus, probably not listening to them properly until the turn of the century, and for a long time thought of them just as the band which Kirk Hammett left to join Metallica. This probably was not helped by some seriously naff album covers such as for ‘Bonded By Blood’ and ‘Impact Is Imminent”, but over the years I have started to enjoy what they produce even though they have had a somewhat interchangeable line-up. However, they have managed to calm that down over the years and since singer Steve Souza returned in 2014 the line-up has been constant, and the last truly new person to join was guitarist Lee Altus in 2001. Although not a founder member, Gary Holt has been the one constant since his arrival in 1982, and alongside drummer Tom Hunting are the only two which played on their debut some 35 years ago. This is their 12th studio album, but their first since 2014’s ‘Blood In, Blood Out’, so what is it like?

Although the production is modern, and there is more bottom end than there would have been back in the day, what we have here is a thrash band who have been around for 40 years and see no reason whatsoever to change their style. Some bands have progressed into different areas, some have regressed into a shadow of their former selves (even though they have made millions), while there are others who have just kept pushing along in the same vein, and that is very much the case with Exodus. The guitars crunch, we get pounding drums, shredding solos, a singer who sounds like he has bene gargling with whisky who is not shy of going up the register, a bassist often playing as if he is on a third guitar linked with the melody, and it is a load of fun. There is nothing new in what they are doing, but Exodus are not attempting to start a new thrash movement, they haven’t finished with the last one yet! An important part of the story at the very beginning, they are still going as if it is still the Eighties, and there will be many metalheads who will happily lose dandruff to this album.
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