{"id":101668,"date":"2023-09-22T00:00:27","date_gmt":"2023-09-21T23:00:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/?p=101668"},"modified":"2023-09-29T13:16:23","modified_gmt":"2023-09-29T12:16:23","slug":"album-review-acid-mass-agonizer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/album-review-acid-mass-agonizer\/","title":{"rendered":"ACID MASS &#8211; Agonizer (2023) | Album \/ EP Reviews @ Metal Forces Magazine"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span class=\"title2\"><strong>ACID MASS<br \/>Agonizer<\/strong><\/span><br \/>\n<img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-content\/themes\/metalforces\/images\/spacer.gif\" border=\"0\" alt=\"\" height=\"3\" \/><br \/>\n<span class=\"title3\"><span style=\"color: #c80000;\">Morbid And Miserable \/ Bonepick (2023)<\/span><br \/><strong>Rating: 8\/10<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"image floatedright\">\n<table width=\"100%\" align=\"center\" cellspacing=\"0\" cellpadding=\"0\" border=\"0\">\n<tr valign=\"top\">\n<td><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-content\/themes\/metalforces\/images\/spacer.gif\" width=\"10\" border=\"0\"><\/td>\n<td>\n<div align=\"center\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/09\/acidmass_agonizer.jpg\" height=\"200\" width=\"200\" border=\"0\"><\/p>\n<table width=\"100%\" align=\"center\" cellspacing=\"0\" cellpadding=\"0\" border=\"0\">\n<tr valign=\"top\">\n<td>\n<div align=\"left\"><span class=\"smalltext\"><\/span><\/div>\n<\/td>\n<td>\n<div align=\"right\"><span class=\"smalltext\"><\/span><\/div>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n<p>Multi-instrumentalist Ben Ricketts is the man behind Ohio\u2019s Acid Mass and over the last year has spewed forth four singles and an EP (<em>Lust For Violence<\/em>). <em>Agonizer<\/em> is the debut full-length, a short ten-track affair that fuses thrash, speed and black metal resulting in a rather blistering and violent tirade.<\/p>\n<p>Only one track (\u2018Shadow Moses\u2019) runs over the three minute mark, the rest are snappy onslaughts heavily influenced by the South American underground scene along with the Teutonic acts Sodom and <a href=\"\/site\/destruction-articles\/\" target=\"_blank\">Destruction<\/a> who formed the first waves of black thrash. The vocals are slightly buried in the mix but this adds to the primeval air, while the guitars act as wiry walls of scowling intensity. It\u2019s rampant material to contend with, and for me it\u2019s all about the scathing axe work as tight, leathery riffs give way to spiralling solos which penetrate the blackness.<\/p>\n<p>There is a real energy here, made all the more appealing with some of the rawer distortion levels. A track like \u2018Christ Crusher\u2019 sounds as if it could have been plucked from an old <em>Speed Kills<\/em> compilation as I get Bulldozer vibes from the nasty grooves. \u2018Torture Rack\u2019 has a more modern <a href=\"\/site\/slayer-articles\/\" target=\"_blank\">Slayer<\/a> sort of vibe with the cutting tone, and the same goes for \u2018Blood In The Air\u2019.<\/p>\n<p><em>Agonizer<\/em> is a devilish debut outing that should appeal to anyone who likes to have their ears raked by scorching, vicious underground thrash.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Neil Arnold<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>ACID MASSAgonizer Morbid And Miserable \/ Bonepick (2023)Rating: 8\/10 Multi-instrumentalist Ben Ricketts is the man behind Ohio\u2019s Acid Mass and over the last year has spewed forth four singles and an EP (Lust For Violence). Agonizer is the debut full-length, a short ten-track affair that fuses thrash, speed and black metal resulting in a rather [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5506,24],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-101668","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-acid-mass","category-album-ep-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101668","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=101668"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101668\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":101670,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101668\/revisions\/101670"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=101668"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=101668"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=101668"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}