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Rating:
Thrash Zone; episode II, "see comments on Annihilation Principle."
Early 80s, thrash has just become a trend, a powerful contagious disease, but still in the phase of maturing and evolving. In '84, Katon W. DePena, a black guy who grew up in the San Francisco underground along with Slayer and Metallica, "not much appreciated in the thematic area," started a group that during its existence would be destined to cross paths with historic bands like Exodus, "Paul Baloff was included in the lineup for a short period as a singer." The project he had in mind was not influenced by the complex melodic twists of Metallica's Ride the Lightning, nor by pseudo-satanic fantasies and brutality that would later give birth to Death Metal, "Slayer's Hell Awaits"; DePena's music was devoid of coordinates, reference points, and above all was not built on the basis of a myth, "like many, too many metal bands back then thought they could make a career using those four riffs that just a dozen years before Black Sabbath used"; it was just a lot of gratuitous and independent violence, torpedoed in small doses and completely pointless, "if the monopoly of thrash music in the 80s had been entrusted to bands like them, today probably neither death nor black would exist." In fact, Hirax boasts a very massive dose of minimalism within their music, a characteristic that from here on would be part of the ethics of many metal bands.
In '85, after recruiting the irascible Scott Owen, Gary Monardo, and John Tabares, "respectively guitar, bass, and drums," DePena decided to experiment on a large scale with what had been planned so far: very fast and elementary songs, often cliché topics; the whole album seems to follow, minute by minute, a fixed standard for constructing each track, from the beautiful "Demons-Evil Forces" to "Bloodbath". From the start, Owen's decent guitar preparation is noticeable: his ability to stick that brief, badass solo into even the shortest and most unlikely track, "Call of the Gods, Bombs of Death" has virtually set a standard. The nasal voice and often incongruous and out of place voice of DePena, "even if not particularly aggressive or pitchy," dominates over all the instruments in every track; perhaps his work is the brightest piece of his entire career: the title track, "Raging Violence," is a strange and somewhat bizarre crossover between his own sound and Clash.
All the songs seem to be of equal level anyway. A good starting point, but if listened to carefully, it is only the confirmation of the band's punk roots.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
04 Bombs of Death ()
The feeling of fear, seath is near: this will be the last war
Politician out of control play deadly games with our lives
Bombs of death; it's over drop from the sky
Nuclear war, get ready - prepare to die
No more love full of hate, this world is doomed to end
Judgment day soon will come dividing the good from the bad
Bombs of death; it's over drop from the sky
Nuclear war, get ready - prepare to die
Nuclear war, dust in the sky
The holocaust has begun
Women and children and men will die
They'll be no one left to fight
No one will live to survive
Life will not exist
Women and children and men will die
They'll be no one left to fight
Bombs of death; it's over drop from the sky
Nuclear war, get ready - prepare to die
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