I believe in a thing called love… oh… not that Darkness… okay Chris Cleo checks out the latest offering from the Teutonic Thrashers Darkness

Say what you will about whether old-schoolers ‘Darkness’ might not be the first, second or even third name that comes to mind in terms of obscure thrash bands – their string of 6 LPs going back to 1987 is enough to cement them into the camp of bands still flying the flag of extreme Teutonic thrash.  With a string of albums having released in metal’s heyday and a second attempt at staying in the loop with now 3 albums having released from 2016, there’s no doubt as to whether these guys know their craft and that they plan to remain as one of the many competent thrash acts in modern thrash.  Their latest effort ‘Blood on Canvas’ is very much so a continuation of their post 2010 albums, with very no-nonsense riffs and arrangements bouncing between Sodom-like speed and the Motorhead-like groove that is very familiar to thrash outside the states.

I don’t have any gripes with this.  I can’t have any gripes with this.  I’ve heard it before but if all the songs sound similar then they’re all solid songs by association.  The same principles that litter the rest of my reviews are still very much apparent here:  blah-blah the fastest songs are my picks for the best and it’s really cool when bands mix it up with epics that mess with the arrangements blah – and that’s exactly what remains.  Opener ‘Wake up in a Rage’ starts the show with a jittery skank beat that winds around heavier breakdowns and drawn out sections whilst hinting at the slower grooves with more traditional heavy metal chord sequences.  Yay – it’s solid.  The first 2 thirds of the album are a collection of solid mid-paced thrashy songs, with the could’ve-been-titled-better ‘A Couple of Kills’ to ‘Truth is a Whore’ being the main bulk of the album, with the only exception being ‘Human Flesh Wasted’ being another rager with an awesome acoustic intro (something that European thrash bands have always done particularly well) laced with keys not dissimilar to ‘Beyond Eternity’, ‘Choir of the Damned’ and the intro to ‘A Shedding of Skin’.  All these tracks are definitely the building blocks of a solid album, but those who are looking for a bit more might’ve felt all the tracks just meld together into one big slab of riffs and groove.

Enter ‘Defcon Four’.  An unexpected salvo of intensity I would’ve thought would be on the A side – hell this could’ve been the opener (although maybe it’s track 7 for this reason specifically).  This is by far the fastest and most demanding track on this record – which in my book immediately makes it the best.  Although you’d think the significance of a relatively minor threat level increase wouldn’t be enough to make the most extreme song on this album you can only think of how extreme DEFCON-1 would be – hopefully there’s something similar on the next record.

The album closes with epic and title-track ‘Blood on Canvas’.  While sometimes I hope for something completely off the wall when I see a post 7-minute album closer as an artistic statement, the song is relatively straightforward (or about as straightforward as an and a half minute song gets).  The track follows what I like to dub ‘The Metallica Formula’, where you double up each verse by transposing the riff up a whole tone, add a 2 minute instrumental intro with some build-up and then breakdown your way after a couple repetitions of your extended verses to about halfway through the song where you bring back something similar to the intro.  It’s really that simple to long out songs and make them seem epic when you read the tracklisting, and I guess by comparison with the other tracks you can get away with describing it as ‘epic’, but overall it’s another categorically fast song with just more riff – what’s not to like.

In all fairness that phrase could be used to sum up the whole album.  Are there some mediocrities?  Too much groove not enough skank beat? That’s all personal preference.  Does the closer follow a very tried and true formula?  Yeah – but Dark Angel did it and Time Does not Heal is the greatest thrash album ever made – so yeah suck on that.  Darkness might’ve just seemed to push out another thrash album, but to fans of thrash that’s all we need and it’s pointless listening to people who are outside looking in.  I hope Defcon Four makes it’s way into the live setlist and fuck it – I hope the title track does too because the opening bass bit sounds real moody and cool.  ‘Blood on Canvas’ turns out to be – given that the blood is about 45 minutes of riff, and the canvas is your lugholes (ears for non-English readers) – is a pretty accurate description for the album.

Blood On The Canvas is out TODAY the 26th April via Massacre Records