"Undiscovered
Gems Of The Late 80's Thrash Metal-Scene" would make a very thin
book indeed. It seems the fans and collectors of this genre are quite
industrious in their search for more, cool underground "cult-records"
to rave about and the bands that are left at the bottom of the barrel
are often left there for a good reason (although a lot of things being
dragged into the light nowadays should definitely have stayed in the dark
and not be given a 2nd chance to waste our time and money - no names.)
I've already told you about
RENEGADE,
HELLER, The "
Metal
Deadness"-split,
MYSTO
DYSTO and
WARMATH, so it's
about bloody time I move westward and enlighten you on what could very
well be the finest not-yet-too-overhyped-old-American-brutal-Thrash-act
to date: MORBID SAINT!
Oh what better way to get your face kicked in than by those chugging,
monstrous chords at the beginning of "Lock Up Your Children"?
Clichés like
'A full-frontal Thrash-assault!' and such makes
perfect sense when listening to this album. It's fast-as-fuck, remorseless,
unstoppable RAW Thrashing Mayhem from start to finish, very much in the
tradition of bands like DARK ANGEL, KREATOR and SADUS and it
never
looses pace. It's very hard to pic some standout track coz it's all so
bloody breathtakingly
fast! (and short) There's tempo changes,
sure, but they're used very skillfully and the whole album feels totally
seamless, like a white-hot projectile shot out of a cannon from some terrible,
future war. It comes with THE
perfect Thrash-production: all the
punch of "Reign In Blood" combined with the roughness of "Darkness
Descends"; probably laid down for less than a 10th of the budgets
of those classics. Of course the vocals are no further from perfection.
Pat Lind sound like a particularly pissed-off Mille Petrozza, invoking
the ghost of Quorthon in his greatest moments. Want another one of those
clichés? How about
'A must-buy for any REAL Thrash Metal fan!'
'Tis true I tell ye.
Well if they're so bloody great why didn't you know about MORBID SAINT
already? The most likely reason for the silence surrounding the band is
the fact that this their sole album was only released in Mexico (!), on
the Avanzada Metálica label which mostly dealt with domestic bands
like TRANSMETAL, NEXT,
GEHENNA
etc, as well as a few licensed Wild Rags-releases (yeah, there's actually
some
Mexican pressings of bands like RECIPIENTS OF DEATH, BLOODCUM
and ANIALATOR up for grabs for those of you sick enough to collect that
useless label..) Obviously their export was minimal, and in retrospect
perhaps that was all for the better as far as the band were concerned.
I guess they'd be hearing from the lawyers of IRON MAIDEN pretty quickly
if that album cover ever got out into the limelight. However, the clandestine
brotherhood know as 'The Global Vinyl-Mafia' has once again done a good
deed unto us all. A box of LPs and CDs have beed unearthed in recent years
and there should still be affordable copies available for those who care
to eye through a few of the larger trade- and distro-lists on the web.
All hail the G.V.M!