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Class 6(66)

Morbid Saint: Spectrum of death

24/08/09  ||  Habakuk

Introduction

This is not a Morbid Angel tribute band. Instead, Morbid Saint’s “Spectrum of death” is hailed as one of the most brutal albums ever by fellow thrash connoisseurs around the globe, and there is really not much to add. It’s up there with the best of ‘em. There’s no intro, but two cymbal smacks into your face, a short build-up, and off we go…

Songwriting

9. These 5 guys from Wisconsin shred their path throughout a 32-minute onslaught. Every song length is covered, from a little bit over 2 minutes up to two songs over seven minutes. They all work equally well, and the intensity of the long songs is equally high as that of the shorter songs, and within the songs there are practically no lengthy slow passages at all, just straightforward high-speed thrashing all the way, let alone a couple of mean breakdown parts. It takes a lot of skill to make a thrash song of seven minutes interesting without changing the pace much, but Morbid Saint make it work, twice.

Despite the length, there’s nothing redundant to be found, but they just throw riff after riff in your face, and I don’t want to be the drummer playing this shit live, as it’s just relentless throughout each and every whole track. Built into the first track there’s actually a sample of formula 1 race cars. That’s right, fucken race cars. It doesn’t fit the theme at all (The song’s called “Locked up your children”… whatever), but if there’s one band that can incorporate something like that and make it fit, it’s these guys here. Hint: Put this CD on in your car. Of course there’s one pointless 40-seconds interlude, the title-track, that could as well be the introduction part for “Scars”, but maybe they foresaw the mp3-age and did us a favor by cutting it off themselves so we can at least enjoy the album without semi-acoustic noodling on the computer.

Production

7. When looking at the equalizer while playing this, you’ll see the area between the very low end and the middle is basically empty. The guitars fight it out with the drums in the treblier sections, and the bass drum works the very bottom, with a slightly clacky sound maybe, but it sounds pretty vicious. The bass guitar can hardly be heard, so this isn’t the punchiest of productions, but i doubt that wouldn’t turn out into a big muddy pile with a constant up-tempo release like this anyway. The way it is, the guitars and drums can be made out clearly and I’m happy.

Guitars

9. And the guitars rip, that’s for sure. I don’t wanna know how many plectrums these two guys wasted in the course of their career, but they better have tight connections to the plectrum producing industry as they bring on some serious shredding and a fuckload of insanely fast riffs. Listen to the beginning of “Crying for death” and join me as I utter an enthusiastic “Hell fucken yes”. The solos are a bit forgettable, but they’re never very long anyway and don’t get in the way. Fine with me as I don’t really care much about most solos anyway.

Vocals

7. Pat Lind wouldn’t sound out of place on quite a few black metal albums and has a raspy but comprehensible shout. And he’s pretty fast too, but well, what are his options with the pedal constantly kept to the floor… Personally, I’m no big fan of this style of singing, but it is far, far from bad and I cannot deny that technically it’s very well done. The vocal lines are fitted onto the music and it all flows perfectly. If your favorite kind of thrash is of the blackened kind, you can probably make that 7 for the vocals a 9.

Bass

6. Well, sometimes you can hear it if you try hard, and it doesn’t sound bad, but Morbid Saint’s just the wrong band for a self-important bass player. If that guy managed to keep up with the guitars throughout all this (and it seems like he does), he’s a small personal legend to me.

Drums

8. This is one fast drummer, and that’s a lot of galopping double-bass. Lee Reynolds doesn’t come across as the most varied guy around, but that statement doesn’t do him justice, because he does add in quite a few fills and he keeps the pace at a very high level. A tom roll after every second riff would be a bit too much for this kind of music, I guess. Kudos for punching this album forward without end. For a taste, check out “Assassin” at around 1:00. That’s among the best fucken transitions into a d-beat I’ve ever heard.

Lyrics

6. Kill Hell die fucking drugs death Satan I don’t care, sing about fucken white rabbits if it makes you happy. They actually sing about a white rabbit, and they alter words to intoxification or manipulization just to make them fit over the riffs better. That’s the fucken spirit.

Kill the white rabbit before it kills you
It lives on the weakness inside
Touching your soul with a pure emptiness
See the spectrum of death in his eyes

Damn straight I’m gonna kill that fucken white rabbit.

Cover art

3. Not so fucken scary as it was intended to be. It looks like Chris Boltendahl from Grave Digger.

Logo

4. The I’s are made of barbed wire, and that’s about the most positive thing I can say about it. It’s really quite ugly.

Booklet

This has been re-released about 5 times, but I haven’t found this CD anywhere yet. Find me a reasonable offer and I’ll be first in line. I hear this has been re-released once again in 2008, so here’s hoping.

Overall and ending rant

In terms of brutality, this is up there with the best of them, Demolition Hammer that is, and it might even have an edge in terms of speed. Fucken intense stuff, right there. Small details like the vocal style make it score a little lower for me, but that’s personal preference. Imagine Hypnosia’s “Extreme hatred”, just better, or imagine “Darkness descends” with a rougher edge in production and vocals, and there you go. This is pretty much a perfect thrash album.

8,5

  • Information
  • Released: 1988
  • Label: Avanzada Metallica
  • Website: www.morbidsaint.com
  • Band
  • Pat Lind: vocals
  • Jay Visser: guitar
  • Jim Fergades: guitar
  • Mike Chappa: bass
  • Lee Reynolds: drums
  • Tracklist
  • 01. Lock up your children
  • 02. Burned at the stake
  • 03. Assassin
  • 04. Damien
  • 05. Crying for death
  • 06. Spectrum of death
  • 07. Scars
  • 08. Beyond the gates of Hell

Class 6(66) -reviews

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