Review by Felix on December 12, 2021.

Terrordome convinced me with their recent output Straight Outta Smogtown and so I decided to add Machete Justice to my collection as well. Of course, going backwards in the discography of a group is always a double-edged thing. On the one hand, you want to listen to an even better album than the one that made you curious, on the other hand no one likes a downward trend from the older to the newer album. Terrordome solve this situation in a pretty Solomon-like way. Straight Outta Smogtown is the better release, but its predecessor holds some fine outbursts as well.

Generally speaking, Terrordome do all the things a young thrash band likes to do – and nothing else. Experiments, detours or delays are unknown in their universe. They set their energy free by shooting off their riffs into the audience, they beat a lot of drum kits into perdition and the lead vocalist screams his lyrics without falling victim to hysteria. Sometimes a few hardcore vibes appear (especially in view of the shouted background vocals), but most of the time the Polish wrecking crew brews pure thrash metal. Freaks who follow Municipal Waste or Gama Bomb will enjoy the sonic and the quite humorous note of the lyrics. At least if we forget the ridiculous band pics in the booklet.

Due to obviously good song-writing skills, the material can be described as pretty mature, coherent and fairly catchy. It goes without saying that tracks like 'Crocodile' with a playtime of 96 seconds do not challenge Watchtower songs in terms of complexity, but pieces like 'Nocturnal Emission' with delicate lyrics (“The phallus is rising… she’s begging for action, some hard f**k-reaction”) weren’t created in order to deliver a musical math exam. They unleash a proper celebration of acoustic violence, no more, no less. Maybe there are a few parts on the album which are going nowhere, but they remain an exception. Instead, the band is able to deliver three extremely convincing tracks in a row. 'Favourite Sport: Mosh' takes no prisoners and the funnily titled 'Italian Stallion' hits the same note. Nobody can deny the band's will to entertain themselves and others in the best possible way and their approach reaches its peak in 'Back To The ‘80s'. It’s another incredibly fast-paced song, but its chorus shines with 10% more catchiness than the other tunes. Every single tone enriches this jewel and at the latest here doom fans realize that they bet on the wrong horse. But it’s never too late to convert!

What’s left to say? The sound is brilliant. It conveys the power and energy of the music excellently. Due to the fact that my copy has been released by Pest Productions, I can also listen to a short Exodus medley. 'Low Rider', 'Braindead' and 'Blacklist' appear with different lyrics. Maybe one day I travel to Poland and ask the band why they did not like the original lyrics. Either way, the album clocks in at 32:56 minutes and everybody with a weakness for carefree thrash at the speed of light should give it a chance.

Rating: 7.8 out of 10

Review by Vladimir on October 17, 2023.

As four wicked occultists attempt to sacrifice a maiden on a full moon night, a barbarian deathstalker wielding his trusty blade, swoops out from the murky swamps to rescue the damsel in distress. The topic I’ll be covering for this review is a Canadian heavy metal band Tower Hill and their debut full-length album Deathstalker, set to be released on October 27th via No Remorse Records. Without any further ado, it’s time to crush your enemies, see them driven before you and hear the lamentation of their women. 

A great and highly promising start with the opening title track 'Deathstalker' hints that you will be hearing tons of guitar melodies, wall breaking heavy metal riff mania, bone crushing double-bass drumming and epic vocals which incorporate high pitch screams during choruses. Next to the heavy riffs and exquisite melodies, you can hear that there are also interesting bass lines and bass melodies on top of that. Apart from the all the catchiness and full throttle that you will witness on tracks such as 'Kings Who Die', 'All The Little Devils Are Proud Of Hell' and 'Antigone', this album also rocks with effective mid-tempo heaviness which is evident on 'In At The Death'. Both 'In At The Death' and 'Antigone' possess some interesting high pitch screams which reminded me a bit of Warrel Dane from the first two Sanctuary albums, especially when combined with the main epic vocals. The general songwriting is very straightforward and pounding heavy metal riffing from start to finish, with tons of epic choruses and melodies which wonderfully spice things up. The great thing about this album is that it’s very easy listening, so you don’t have to worry about missing any key detail in the music or losing track, because the entire thing is stylistically consistent from one song to another and every bit is kept to a simple yet highly effective level. The overall themes that Tower Hill deals with on Deathstalker are traditional mythological, war and fantasy themes which nicely fit with the kind of musical output incorporated in every song. Funnily enough, I presumed that this would be a conceptual album about Conan the Barbarian or even Korgoth of Barbaria for some weird reason, if you remember that Adult Swim short. Although I did enjoy the album as a whole, there were moments when I felt that the album was a bit lacking in tone and not quite as memorable as I wanted it to be. Indeed, every bit of performance on this album is great but somehow it seems like it was just a few steps away from being one of the exceptional heavy metal albums of the year. This isn’t to say that the album is entirely generic or repetitive, far from it, the only thing that I am pointing out is that Deathstalker could have been so much more to what it is and all that it’s just missing was to hit the right note which would definitely bring the album on a higher spot among the traditional heavy metal releases of 2023. However, if you manage to look aside from the small issue and you just came here to enjoy some good traditional heavy metal music like I did, then I don’t have to tell you that this album is ideal for you. 

In the end, I consider Deathstalker to be a fairly enjoyable album that will definitely be picked up by dedicated NWOTHM fans. Tower Hill did a good job overall and they certainly seem to be fans of sword and sorcery inspired heavy metal albums which is what they seem to be going for. Fans of bands like Visigoth, Eternal Champion and Megaton Sword should check this one out and see if this will quench your undying thirst for steel and vengeance. 

Rating: 8.2 out of 10