{"id":52540,"date":"2016-12-02T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2016-12-02T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/?p=52540"},"modified":"2017-02-13T15:24:24","modified_gmt":"2017-02-13T15:24:24","slug":"album-review-various-artists-speed-kills-vii","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/album-review-various-artists-speed-kills-vii\/","title":{"rendered":"VARIOUS ARTISTS – Speed Kills VII (2016) | Album \/ EP Reviews @ Metal Forces Magazine"},"content":{"rendered":"

VARIOUS ARTISTS
Speed Kills VII<\/strong><\/span>
\n\"\"
\nMusic For Nations (2016)<\/span>
Rating: 7\/10<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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In 1985 a heavy metal compilation was released under the name of Speed Kills<\/em>. I got into heavy metal around 1987 through the strains of Iron Maiden, Ozzy Osbourne etc. But one day I heard a band named Slayer and their 1985 opus Hell Awaits<\/em>, and everything changed.<\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t know that music could be played so fast or sound so evil, and so shortly after buying said album from a friend for the measly price of \u00a32.50 I then stumbled across Speed Kills<\/em>. I was a teenager, but one terrified by the guttural tones of Celtic Frost, Bulldozer, Voivod, Venom, Possessed and Destruction. I was never the same again.<\/p>\n

Compilation albums were a brilliant way of introducing us young metalheads to new, and not-so-new bands. It was also a way of not having to spend all of our pocket money on a band we wasn\u2019t so sure about. And by diving in to such a compilation, it opened up so many doors… but they were often foreboding doors, gateways to hell. <\/p>\n

The first five Speed Kills<\/em> albums are vital landmarks in metal history; they emerged in quick succession and ended in 1990. A sixth instalment would emerge in 1992, but I somehow missed the boat in spite of it containing excellent content. And so it is with great delight that I welcome you to the seventh volume.<\/p>\n

Okay, so Daniel P. Carter should be fired for the crap cover artwork, and I wish we\u2019d been treated to a juicy double opus like a few of the latter volumes. I also wish that the album contained tracks by some of the thrash big guns; Destruction, Sodom, Overkill, Death Angel et al are all still going strong and I\u2019m of the opinion that any young kid just getting into metal should learn about the history rather than jumping into the more recent waves. But I guess I have to be grateful that this series has returned, and this time around we get ten tracks by ten bands, all from the UK.<\/p>\n

First up is The King Is Blind; Essex-based death thrashers who don\u2019t really bring anything new to the table \u2013 but then again I\u2019m just fussy. \u2018Throne Of Skulls\u2019 is a frothing track with a rather clean-cut, polished thrashy barrage and deep, sepulchral vocals. But my issue here is that this just sounds like so much stuff that\u2019s been doing the rounds this side of the millennium. It\u2019s catchy and aggressive, but rather generic.<\/p>\n

The same could be said for rasping horrors Formicarius. These Londoners play a sneering, yet crisp and atmospheric style of black metal. On \u2018Lake Of The Dead\u2019 there\u2019s a tinkle of keys, but it\u2019s mostly a straight-up, often frosty black metal torrent with the addition of a nice, almost traditional metal melody running through it. The tone of Lord Saunders\u2019 vocals is decipherable, and the band in general steer well clear of the usual mucky, grimy grimness of so many to offer up a decent, polished Gothic strain of extreme metal.<\/p>\n

The biggest entry on offer here though is from Acid Reign. These guys were around during the late 80s \/ early 90s and have featured on the last three volumes of Speed Kills<\/em>. Their latest offering, \u2018Plan Of The Damned\u2019, is a nice, infectious chug-fest of crossover thrash. H\u2019s vocals have never sounded so menacing, and with this track the Yorkshire posse show the kids how it\u2019s done. Indeed, \u2018Plan Of The Damned\u2019 takes us back to the late 80s, with the guys showing no signs of rustiness as they plod with utter menace before a zany spell at just over the three-minute mark where all instruments collide into a killer frenzy.<\/p>\n

Rather breathless, I dive in again, and this time it\u2019s Amulet. This London bunch formed in 2010 and have been banging heads ever since with their brand of straight-up galloping metal. With \u2018Highwayman\u2019 we are treated to a demo version soaked in 80s nostalgia from Jamie Elton\u2019s no frills commands and the twin guitar assault of Marek \u201cHeathen\u201d Steven and Nippy Blackford. It\u2019s straigtht down the line, balls to the wall metal and you can\u2019t fault them for wearing their hearts and influences on their sleeve.<\/p>\n

To round off side one, we meet Divine Chaos, a Berkshire-based band who formed in 2006. Having only released one album (2014\u2019s A New Dawn In The Age Of War<\/em><\/a>) I\u2019m rather surprised then that the compilers of this volume plundered its depths for a song which comes in the form of the metallic surge known as \u2018Ignorance Everlasting\u2019. In a sense, it\u2019s a thrash-by-number journey featuring salivating vocal spits and nice strains of melody, but there\u2019s nothing here that really jumps out from a whole host of similar sounding bands to have bloated the scene over the last decade or so. <\/p>\n

On the flip side we have Akercocke with \u2018Inner Sanctum\u2019. The recently reformed veteran extreme metallers bring their usual angular and unusual variety of heavier metal. The barking bellows of Jason Mendon\u00e7a are complimented by the jarring guitar strains and trundling bass; the result being a full-blown Gothic tirade to welcome the guys back into the fray.<\/p>\n

Next up we have Dungeon and \u2018Death From Above\u2019, which is wrenched from the London band\u2019s 2016 six-track demo English Hell<\/em>. The track is a rollicking outburst of standard speed metal in Teutonic vein which harks back to the rusty 80s, and it\u2019s probably the most fitting tune on this compilation.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Voices \u2013 featuring current and ex-members of Akercocke \u2013 combine a progressive streak with their dark brand of black \/ death metal on \u2018Petrograph\u2019, but again this is a difficult one to get into for me in spite of the commanding vocal presence and hammering rhythm section. Fans of Type O Negative though will certainly revel in the sinister aspects of this cut. <\/p>\n

The last two tracks on offer come from Desolator (\u2018Full Power\u2019) and Nine Covens (\u2018Through Fires Of Tyranny\u2019). The former is a rather tepid Kreator-styled speed metal romp of no real identity or power considering its title. As for Nine Covens, we have a routine black metal-by-numbers cacophony that offers up the usual dark ambience and spiky noise to bring this latest volume to a close.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m certainly joyous that it has come, but there\u2019s certainly an uneven quality to proceedings. If given the task I would have revelled in choosing the bands to have featured, but as it stands Speed Kills VII<\/em> is not great, but hopefully it hints at more to come.<\/p>\n

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

VARIOUS ARTISTSSpeed Kills VII Music For Nations (2016)Rating: 7\/10 In 1985 a heavy metal compilation was released under the name of Speed Kills. I got into heavy metal around 1987 through the strains of Iron Maiden, Ozzy Osbourne etc. But one day I heard a band named Slayer and their 1985 opus Hell Awaits, and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3311,3315,3314,3318,1244,3316,3313,3319,3312,2771,3317],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-52540","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-acid-reign","category-akercocke","category-amulet","category-desolator","category-divine-chaos","category-dungeon","category-formicarius","category-nine-covens","category-speed-kills","category-the-king-is-blind","category-voices"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52540","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=52540"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52540\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":52543,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52540\/revisions\/52543"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52540"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52540"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52540"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}