{"id":93345,"date":"2022-04-22T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-04-21T23:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/?p=93345"},"modified":"2022-05-03T15:27:57","modified_gmt":"2022-05-03T14:27:57","slug":"album-review-skull-fist-paid-in-full","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/album-review-skull-fist-paid-in-full\/","title":{"rendered":"SKULL FIST – Paid In Full (2022) | Album \/ EP Reviews @ Metal Forces Magazine"},"content":{"rendered":"

SKULL FIST
Paid In Full<\/strong><\/span>
\n\"\"
\nAtomic Fire (2022)<\/span>
Rating: 5.5\/10<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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Resurrecting the spirit of classic 80s bands such as Dokken and Scorpions, Canadian headbangers Skull Fist returns with their fourth full-length studio album. The outing comes four years after 2018\u2019s Way Of The Road<\/em>, which to my ears was a tad disappointing.<\/p>\n

Paid In Full<\/em> is standard melodic metal that\u2019s easy on the ear. The record sets its stall up nicely with the opening title track which is bright and breezy, complete with effortless soaring chorus, nifty guitar work and simple yet sturdy percussion.<\/p>\n

Straight from the bowels of 1986-87, this is generic yet catchy metal bolstered by Zach Slaughter\u2019s simple guitar fizzes and his equally solid vocal cries. JJ Tartaglia\u2019s drums do their job, more so on the heavier rampages and particularly with the more fiery numbers such as \u2018Long Live The Fist\u2019 which exudes that Exciter air of speeding melody. But for an album that\u2019s probably taken a few years to concoct it\u2019s all rather generic 80s worship, flight of foot but lacking overall oomph.<\/p>\n

\u2018Crush, Kill, Destroy\u2019 isn\u2019t as convincing as its title suggest it might be, but \u2018Madman\u2019 sports a decent lick after building on Casey Guest\u2019s steady bass and those percussive nods. Again, it\u2019s standard metal that\u2019s not going to shake your foundations.<\/p>\n

Skull Fist seems to sit more comfortably with the speedier outbursts such as \u2018For The Last Time\u2019 with its foaming gallop, while \u2018Warrior Of The North\u2019 rattles like a tin can in gale force winds.<\/p>\n

The album does lack heaviness, the production sounds thin, but there is an airy feel to proceedings too. However, one gets the impression that the band assembled the only handful of tracks they had, quickly recorded them and fooled themselves into thinking it would make a quality album. Yet for every blazing solo, every slamming drum beat and bass line and every wail from Zach Slaughter\u2019s lungs, Paid In Full<\/em> is just average metal with flashes of goodness.<\/p>\n

Matched by the clich\u00e9d artwork, this opus flashes by and makes no real impact other than just being another modern day trad\u2019 metal re-enactment. It\u2019s difficult to write more on such generic metal \u2013 there\u2019s a ton of this sort of thing doing the rounds today \u2013 but if you like up-tempo, hackneyed rockin\u2019, then jump in.<\/p>\n

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

SKULL FISTPaid In Full Atomic Fire (2022)Rating: 5.5\/10 Resurrecting the spirit of classic 80s bands such as Dokken and Scorpions, Canadian headbangers Skull Fist returns with their fourth full-length studio album. The outing comes four years after 2018\u2019s Way Of The Road, which to my ears was a tad disappointing. Paid In Full is standard […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24,981],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-93345","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-album-ep-reviews","category-skull-fist"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93345","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=93345"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93345\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":93346,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/93345\/revisions\/93346"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=93345"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=93345"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=93345"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}