{"id":104147,"date":"2024-10-25T00:00:47","date_gmt":"2024-10-24T23:00:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/?p=104147"},"modified":"2024-10-30T10:46:16","modified_gmt":"2024-10-30T10:46:16","slug":"album-review-pounder-thunderforged","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/album-review-pounder-thunderforged\/","title":{"rendered":"POUNDER – Thunderforged (2024) | Album \/ EP Reviews @ Metal Forces Magazine"},"content":{"rendered":"

POUNDER
Thunderforged<\/strong><\/span>
\n\"\"
\nShadow Kingdom (2024)<\/span>
Rating: 5.5\/10<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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Back in 2021 I reviewed the sophomore album from Los Angeles, California-based trio Pounder, Breaking The World<\/em><\/a>, and wasn\u2019t exactly excited or convinced by guitarist Matt Harvey\u2019s (Gruesome, Exhumed, Dekapitator etc.) vocal performance. As albums go there were plenty of weighty moments, but its generic nature meant that no feathers were rustled during several plays.<\/p>\n

So, here we are again, with Pounder\u2019s third full-length with Harvey once more joined by lead guitarist Tom Draper (Hands Of Goro, ex-Savage Messiah, ex-Primitai) and bassist Alejandro Corredor (Nausea).<\/p>\n

Obviously one cannot ignore the cool album art as opener \u2018Sound And Fury\u2019 beats its chest and methodically worms its way through trad metal chords before the fiery charge. Harvey sounds more authentic and organic in his vocal style now and rooted in the mid-80s US metal scene. It\u2019s certainly a strong start as the trio trade instrumental blows through a curtain of playful flames. However, as the album unravels one feels short changed as I\u2019m bemused by the tepid production.<\/p>\n

This is the sort of album that should kick you in the balls after setting fire to your house, but no, the guitar seems to be lost in the background and everything comes coated in a layer of cheese in its desperate attempt to sound nostalgic, and a majority of the lyrics are responsible for that.<\/p>\n

Very quickly Harvey\u2019s vocals become stretched, especially on the bloody awful ballad \u2018Deeper Than Blood\u2019 where again the sound suffers. Surely the band isn\u2019t doing this weak production thing to sound old? If so, it hasn\u2019t worked as another cheese ball in the form of \u2018Metal Eternal\u2019 wafts like a bad smell on the eggy breeze of more bad lyrics.<\/p>\n

Okay, so some of the riffs are decent \u2013 not that the production aids them in their quest \u2013 especially on the charge of the title track, and the band aren\u2019t strangers to an infectious chorus either. There are even some fine leads littered throughout such as on \u2018Wet And Wreckless\u2019, but it all just bleeds into one bog standard, although sometimes anthemic, composition.<\/p>\n

\u2018Get Pounded\u2019 gallops with some intent and \u2018Line Of Fire\u2019 is just as boisterous. In fact, the whole album sizzles with metallic fury, but rarely am I convinced by such promises as I relegate Pounder\u2019s latest offering to the pile of material I probably won\u2019t revisit for some time, if at all.<\/p>\n

Neil Arnold<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

POUNDERThunderforged Shadow Kingdom (2024)Rating: 5.5\/10 Back in 2021 I reviewed the sophomore album from Los Angeles, California-based trio Pounder, Breaking The World, and wasn\u2019t exactly excited or convinced by guitarist Matt Harvey\u2019s (Gruesome, Exhumed, Dekapitator etc.) vocal performance. As albums go there were plenty of weighty moments, but its generic nature meant that no feathers […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24,4103],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-104147","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-album-ep-reviews","category-pounder"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104147","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=104147"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104147\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":104148,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104147\/revisions\/104148"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=104147"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=104147"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=104147"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}