Dropdead : " s/t"

These guys are back. Somethings have changed a little.  The vocals are not just screaming and much more deliberate on the first song. At just under two minutes "Torches" has more time to develop it's self into an acutal song, where some of these ditties are aborted too early. "Road to Absolution" is more hard core than grind core, aside from the fact they keep it to an under a minute burst. At 33 seconds I can not really count "Only Victims" as a song it's more of an idea. They stick to the basics when it comes to hard core. They are fast and nasty. It is a good thing they keep "Warfare State" to just over a minute, because any more than what they do here or other songs would be redundant if they went longer. I would lose interest for sure in some of these blasts of speed. By the time they got to "the Black Mask' this was beginning to get old for me.

The vocals get stale first. The guitar follow quickly behind them. The drummer is earning his pay for sure."Book of Hate' shows what they are capable with a more metallic bass line leading into this like it is going to be a dirge. It is deliberate like " I Saw Your Mommy" . So it takes me back to better place for punk. "Flesh and Blood" is two minutes so yet another song that is allowed to be more than a spastic temper tantrum. This is the band's 3rd album since forming in 1991, so it is kind of a big deal. This might make you come to conclusions like they would care more about song writing since they had plenty of time. The Cro-mags who I have to assume are an inspiration, do something similar but allow themselves to expand into songs. "Stoking the Flame" is more of a temper tantrum.

Some of these bursts are better than others as I like "Nothing Remains" , but " Hatred Burning' did not do much for me.Lyrically there is more to "Nothing Remains"  There is more of a thrashing to "Abattoir of Pain".  "Hail to the Emperor" is a minute and a half. It races off into punk tropes that sound like all the others. The extra time did not benefit them. I can not really say this is not my thing ,as I do like Cro-mags style hardcore, I think their approach to song writing is not my thing. I will give this a 7.5 , pretty mediocre from supposed legends.