Date: 2020
Total Time: 45:28
Label: Silver Lining Music
This is the seventeenth effort for the Canadian musician Jeff Waters and his personal band, ANNIHILATOR, thirty (!) years already since the classic debut “Alice In Hell”, which established them in the Thrash Metal and the changes in the lineup after so many years are once again unavoidable. Unfortunately ANNIHILATOR is a band that is not known for its consistency in the quality of the records it presents.
“Ballistic, Sadistic” is reminiscent of early ANNIHILATOR, a kind of return to those “glorious” days record. At the same time, it is their most diverse album in many years. The speeds are mainly mid tempo, but also fast in many songs and the riffs are as always “sharp as a razor”. Jeff’s voice, although never being the best in Thrash Metal (probably far from it) is better than ever before, as he shows significant improvement and anyone who listens to it will be sure he has had a lot of work in that area. The characteristic aggressive solos are here, melodic at times and Jeff’s shredding trademark solos are again present. But here, unlike some of their previous work, shredding doesn’t just is in the album for nothing. His solos are inspired and they really have something to “say” to the listener. The album is also quite versatile in the sense that it has different kinds of songs inside of it. I’m sure that it’s impossible for anyone not to find even one song (at least) to like.
“Ballistic, Sadistic” presents a first varied, rhythmic track with many different solos, is fast tempo and mid tempo at times, it is groovy, with many alternations. “The Attitude” is slow only at the beginning, while it becomes very fast in the process and has some technical parts, but the big surprise comes to “Psycho Ward”, which is logical to be perhaps the favorite track of many of the listeners. Mid-tempo track, tribute to the ‘80s hair / heavy metal, with sleaze riffs, quite melodic chorus, with less intense Thrash elements. Then we have “I am warfare” and here is a clean Thrash / Death Metal track and from there on we encounter a combination of Thrash and Heavy Metal attack (even some prog elements are found in “Dressed Up For Evil”) with melody, different speeds and situations. Maybe we could have the same quality in the second half of the album as we have it in the first, but that might be just me, since the differences are not that big.
This is ANNIHILATOR’s best album with Jeff Waters on vocals (talking about the last decade) and one of the best Thrash Metal albums of 2020 so far. Modern Thrash / Heavy metal, as it should be!
Rating: 7/10
Editor: George Kourou
Related Link: ANNIHILATOR – Official Page
