Review by Felix on July 17, 2024.

What do football coaches, politicians and musicians have in common? They tend to miss the right time to quit. Sabina stopped Holy Moses too late, Destruction’s last good albums are almost 20 years old, Kreator play soulless wannabe thrash and Sodom have the duty to play the exception which confirms the norm. And Tankard? Well, releases like “The Beauty and the Beer” or “B-Day” haven proven that you should never write off the weird freaks from Frankfurt am Main. The band is not one of these typical one-decade-wonder of the eighties, although the spontaneity of their debut and the impressive power and quality of “Chemical Invasion” will never return. “Pavlov’s Dawgs”, of course, also cannot challenge these classics. Nevertheless, the album is still good enough to lend an ear and therefore it is still unknown whether Tankard belong to those people and groups who miss the perfect moment to say goodbye. Their time just has not come so far.

Two songs of the album stand out. On the one hand, we have “Veins of Terra”. Its lyrics deal with the climate change and those who say that such thing does not exist. The mid-paced composition shines with density and, in alignment with the lyrics, an ominous undertone. Its riffs impress with strict robustness and Gerre delivers a strong and expressive performance. As always, I want to add. He and Frank Thorwarth, the backbone of the band, deserve a lot of respect for their unbroken commitment. Surprising but true, even Eintracht Frankfurt has a few likeable fans, haha. Anyway, on the other hand we get “Lockdown Forever” which convinces right from its thundering drum beats at the beginning. They are combined with the best riff of the album and the whole thing culminates in a very good bridge and a heavy and pretty catchy chorus. The guitar work of Andy Gutjahr is excellent here, including a fine solo, of course. The lyrics are typical of Tankard, entertaining and quirky, but the subject matter seems thankfully dated these days. Corona, was there something? All that shit with all the idiotic restrictions seems light years away to me.

The other songs deliver stuff which is somewhere between acceptable and good. “Dark Self Intruder” has some fine sequences, for example its fantastic intro, and gets the bronze medal here. It is another song with a political message and even though or especially because Tankard seem to have another view on the world than I, I wish they would concentrate on this kind of tracks. They are slightly darker than the rest and, to be honest, jokes like “Beerbarians” are not very funny any longer. By the way, this song (or “Ex-Fluencer”, the title track or “Memento”) mirrors the ambivalence of the album. These cuts are definitely too good to hate them. They do not leave me cold, but the final thrill and / or a brilliant chorus is missing. And there is another point I want to mention: does the scene really need ten Tankard tracks with a playtime of 55 minutes? In former times, compactness was a feature of the best tracks of the band, just remember the simple song patterns of the debut or comparatively late neckbreakers like “Slipping from Reality”, “Frankfurt: We Need More Beer” or “G.A.L.OW.”. Naturally, the guys do not need advices from my side, but Tankard should go back to the roots instead of prolonging the songs unnecessarily. I assume that in particular “Metal Cash Machine” would have massively benefited from a less opulent arrangement, but its rebellious riffs get a bit lost during the six and a half minutes.

I appreciate that Tankard still play pure thrash (their confusion at the times of “The Tankard” and “Disco Destroyer” is no longer worth mentioning) and after roughly 20 decades (or more!) in the business, it is no surprise that they know how they want to sound. From this follows that the powerful production is flawless; transparent, but not polished and clean, but not sterile. So one can enjoy this album, perhaps not always and not each and every part, but it is definitely better than some former outputs of the Hessians, for example the often overrated “The Meaning of Life”. To summarise, I would still be happy to hear more albums from the band, not just out of local patriotism, but because they still seem authentic and likeable. So greetings from Bornheim and thrash on.

Rating: 7.2 out of 10

Review by Jeger on July 23, 2024.

I remember the days when Cannibal Corpse were a lot more than the commercial death metal powerhouse that they are today. The artwork, the aggression, the lyrics and Barnes - a repulsive cocktail of volatile poison to the average American household. And the kids were all over it… Chuck and Death had led the way with their debut record and before we all knew to look over our shoulders, from out of Buffalo, New York and down to Tampa, Florida, Cannibal made their way, and the world of death metal has never been the same. No one was prepared for these dudes and never before had such grisly music been unleashed on American soil. Their debut, “Eaten Back to Life” and 1991’s “Butchered At Birth” - downright absurd in their flagrance and neither pastors, parents nor therapists could quite wrap their heads around them. Cannibal Corpse were the epitome of everything that extreme metal was meant to be.

True death metal was destroyed at the turn of the millennium. It gained popularity once people began to understand that it was nothing more than a sonic horror flick. Shock value? Gone and I believe that as a result, more and more bands began to realize that they’d better get to innovating before the trend died. Subsequently, outfits like the aforementioned Death and Monstrosity began to experiment; carrying the music over technicality’s threshold into and onward toward genre revolution. Cannibal Corpse? Well, they just sat back and held down the fort; unwavering in their mission to create only the most violent and depraved death metal. Sure, the thrill of the kill has faded into mere entertainment value for horror buffs and riff junkies, but the spirit and energy have always been there as Cannibal have so valiantly stayed true to what they’ve always done.

Now, death metal has become something rather silly thanks to bands like Cattle Decapitation whose idea of DM is a modern day abomination. AI cover art, sanitized production and overwhelming percussion. Not to mention carbon-fiber tech bands like Archspire whose main ambitions revolve around creating death metal to impress other musicians as opposed to bringing the old-fashioned carnage. But alas, Cannibal Corpse are having none of it as usual. On September 22, CC released their latest effort, “Chaos Horrific” via Metal Blade.

Scarce are the telltale chops and grinds that have so defined Cannibal Corpse’s style over the decades. With “Chaos Horrific”, the band are drawing blood with a bit more ease as opposed to the usual frantic disembowelment. Fluid progressions, swifter tempos and a rejuvenated approach to soloing have made for a more unique experience than what we’ve come to know. Tracks like “Overlords of Violence” and “Frenzied Feeding” channel old-school Sepultura and herald Kreator’s debut “Pleasure to Kill” with thrash-hearty riffs and flesh-blistering leads. So much more life to this album, nothing forced or vulgarly misplaced. Cannibal Corpse are quite simply in the zone on this one. Taking it easy as it were… The approach toward percussion a martial one and it’s a guitar-driven affair from beginning to end. Tried and true songwriting methods, fundamentally sound and epic yet simple in regard to its segmented compositions - an album for one who’s taken aback more by class than brutality alone. Finally, a new Cannibal Corpse record that testifies to the band’s long and deep-running understanding of what traditional cranium-splattering death metal should sound like. A little something to bang your sick heads to.

“Chaos Horrific’s” high water mark is undoubtedly the titular cut. Midway through the album, you’ll experience Cannibal Corpse at what I feel is a newfound apex. A little finesse and a lot of speed, a respectable level of catchiness and predictable but in no way boring - one of this legendary band’s finest album contributions. Cannibal Corpse have loosened the old belt a bit and much of “Chaos Horrific” feels like a loose studio session; “Entombed “Wolverines Blues” level jam and disregard for technicality. It feels almost as if CC had a lot more fun this time around. Something had to be done. Another album like “Violence Unimagined” would’ve been an exercise in redundancy. Cannibal Corpse are proving that there’s still some gas in the tank and I feel that it’s of the utmost importance for them to adhere to what they did here. A nice change of scenery from the typical “let’s try to create the most brutal album ever” type of American death metal recording.

Rating: 8.5 out of 10

Review by Michael on August 23, 2023.

Only two years after Violence Unimagined guys from Cannibal Corpse are going to release their 25th studio album Chaos Horrific. I guess they used the Covid-19 lockdown times very productively, otherwise I cannot explain the short time period between the two albums. For me Violence Unimagined was a quite okayish Cannibal Corpse release, I feel very different about Chaos Horrific.

Starting with a casual The Bleeding - in memoriam bass riff, 'Overlords Of Violence' (damn, the title reminds me of an old Playstation game) goes into a very interesting direction. Although the song sounds pretty much like a "normal" Cannibal Corpse song, it has some nuances that make the song a very catchy and with a few other ones the most accessible song on the album. The guitar solos are pretty sick and the whole thing is a high speed neck breaking trip that leaves no room to breathe. That's a very good start for sure. With 'Summoned For Sacrifice' the band has released their second single a few days ago and this one may be the most outstanding and catchiest song on the album. The lyrics are pretty sick and Corpsegrinder's vocals sound as malevolent as possible. The song is a pretty much a mid-tempo stomper, only here and there the Floridians increase the tempo to severe some body parts. 'Blood Blind' starts with some slow lava-flowing Morbid Angel-like riffing (not the only parts where you can clearly recognize Erik Rutans influence on the song writing) but soon turns into a slow galloping avalanche of massive death metal riffs. That's a pretty simplistic but brutal track. But as I mentioned before not all songs make it that easy. Let's take the title track as a very good example. The beat of the song is very confusing and the term "chaos" matches pretty good to the song. Okay, not right from the start but when the vocals start Paul Mazurkiewicz's drumming sounds very unusual and very technical. Same goes to the sick guitar solo which again reminds of Morbid Angel or early Hate Eternal. But there are also some really typical CC songs to find here like 'Pitchfork Impalement' (hell yeah, the fall and the harvest will come soon!) or 'Vengeful Invasion'. Oh, and with 'Pestilential Rictus' they do have written a very punkish one with some fantastic thrash borrowings, too. Just check the song structure and you will know what I mean.

There are a lot of cool surprises in the songs. In comparison to its predecessor, the songwriting is much more diverse and this is the reason why in my humble opinion this might be one of the three best Cannibal Corpse albums in their discography. The band hasn't focused that much on brutality and technicality this time but more on variety and joy of playing. I guess that they had a quite different approach towards the song writing this time which seems to be successful and somewhat refreshing. Also the production of Chaos Horrific is well done. The instruments sound powerful and well-balanced and the crushing vocals are brutal as hell. There were some albums that didn't sound that good in the past. If the next album will be that amazing and we just have to wait 2 more years again, I won't be sad about it!

Rating: 9.2 out of 10