Annihilator
Remains

1997. A bad year for Jeff Waters and for the metal scene in general, especially thrash.
What many define as a "decline" for Annihilator had already been underway for some time (some say since "Set The World On Fire," others from "King Of The Kill"), but being a die-hard fan, I never really perceived this creative and qualitative drop that much, partly because, after all, it was these changes in style and line-up that led me to become passionate about the Canadian band.

This is almost unanimously considered their worst work, and in some respects, it is true, but like any Annihilator album, it conceals real gems that I don't think it’s fair to belittle with such superficiality.
Take, for example, songs like "Sexecution", with a very suggestive drum intro that partly recalls the more recent "Betrayed", or "No Love" with its driving rhythm and very catchy chorus.
Both are characterized by the use of electronic sounds and drum machine (like most of the tracks), which ultimately are the main reasons for the album’s failure with the fans, who opposed such daring experimentations.

And it is precisely for this reason that I decided to review "Remains"...

I would like you not to stop at common thoughts and listen to this album carefully, without prejudice, not as metalheads but simply as lovers of good music.
Let yourselves be carried away by Jeff's genius and his compositional and performance skill, traveling from the modern and electronic sounds of the first part of the album to the simpler and more immediate ones of the second ("Humans Remains" and "Dead Wrong"), which vaguely hint at songs from Metallica's Load era, then moving to more typically thrash songs, complicated and extremely engaging ("I Want" and especially "Tricks and Traps" and "Reaction"), which will surely satisfy even longtime fans, and finally reaching the calm and very inspired atmospheres that Waters has always accustomed us to ("Wind" and the mysterious closing instrumental "Bastiage").

An album, therefore, that despite presenting some objective declines, has countless peaks of creativity, originality, and good taste, which have never been appreciated, not even by Waters himself, who recently gave it a 5.5/10, but honestly, I believe he doesn’t really think so...