Tankard
Chemical Invasion

THE REVIEW

Listening to an album by the Teutonic Tankard is like downing, in the summer evening after work, a mug of ice-cold beer, feeling it seep out of your pores, looking at their faces on the vinyl's back cover that we hold in our hand, and turning on the stereo.

Fast tempos, guitars like sizzling electric wires, "Peace goes out" to the bands in the sector, inner album cover with photo collage, current producer, and malleable logo hold their importance in thrash metal, but too often the packaging is more intriguing than the content. It's the case of the Americans Acrophet who speed along without a trace of catchy refrains, persist undaunted in pulverizing ears without crafting an engaging break, pile up duplicate songs and recycle riffs from the first bands of the genre, hoping for the fans' forgetfulness: it seems that speed itself embodies chaos in our ears, making the sound of axes mixed with cymbals, snare, and toms irritating. Tankard play briskly but with grace (under pressure), they shout with force but do not irritate, they don't even seem like good musicians yet they create their little underground hits ("Acid Death", "Mercenary", just to name a few), they release albums repeatedly to this day, with accompanying collections and celebratory DVDs, highlighted by their usual sarcastic cover art and analysis of their works, almost always in favor of our staunch beer brewers.

"Chemical Invasion", released in October 1987, is the second official record of the German band, the platter most fragrant with malt and hops, characterized by an underlying irony that coincides with the roar of the guitars. With this product, Tankard refine their debut "Zombie Attack", revealing to the world that you can play at high speeds without declining into chaotic thrash, sing furiously without the clarity of a Michael Kiske, pound the drums without inhibition, without finesse of a luxury restaurant yet resulting in catchiness. After a filthy intro of about 17 seconds, "Total Addiction" is hurled in the listener's face, agreeing with everyone with its raw riff, penetrating like the echo of cars racing on the highway, and continues swiftly like an arrow shot by Robin "The New Priest" Hood, with the persistent "tap-tap-tap" of the pedal, while Andreas Geremia angrily declaims the unhealthy use that teenagers make of alcohol and drugs:

"... listen to Tankard, you need a thrash dose/a full load of their music and beer/sufficient reason to kick your drugs"

The cover artwork with the first appearance of the cartoon mad doctor is comforting, similar to the real one from the cover of "Method Of Madness" by Obsession, preparing the right poisonous chemicals to sabotage the beer. This habit is described in the album's title track. After an initial digression into hard rock, with riffs plucked from the '70s chest (as Overkill would do with "Spiritual Void"), comes the dive into the usual thrash:

"STOP THE CHEMICAL INVASION!" German beer is always the best/Pure is free from chemical agents/A standard of which we are proud/A standard never encountered in other lands/Purity laws free from chemical agents/No pollutants - no change"

But if we think Tankard are just boozers, we have the ready contradiction with the song "Don't Panic":

"Do you care about the world we live in?/ Are you aware?/ Death! Murder! The war is raging/ Kill! Die! your child is dead/ But this is a cause - this is what they tell us/ So they lie/ Out of war - they inflict terror/ Millions die/ Yes they say: no mistake at Chernobyl/ and they're looking for another cure for AIDS/ They send guns to Nicaragua/ And dissolve fingers in Afghanistan/ No panic - this is just our world/ Fatal disease that will kill society/ Safe sex? No! Hope! They are all residual cures of a cure/ last! chance! time is running out"

The two axes Andy and Axel weave effective solos that swell the piece without removing its sharpness: a metallic food like this could lift us at 8 on a Monday morning as we punch in. The storm continues with "Tantrum": riff that "drops" like a MiG in a dive and an oligophrenic guitar solo shoots from the guitar like an old grumbling woman scolding the road pirate who almost ran her over on the pedestrian strip. The approximate production by Harris Jonhs is truly dusty and reserves poor treatment to Frank Thorwart's bass, although listening to Protector's "Misanthropy" lifts our spirits. After all, this is teutonic thrash. Kalle Trapp, Harris Jonhs, Horst Muller, and Roy Rowland escort the heavy soldiers of metal to their confirmation ceremony, putting them in a position to emerge from the cellars. They serve them on the scene of the moment without asking how far they will go. At first, this album seems challenging for our ears, the band itself we consider too carnival-like, no business and all "Empty Tankard", endowed only with much restlessness and awareness of their means. With these premises, the raw sound appears magical and unrepeatable, slightly improvable. We realize all this with the album's masterpiece track, with a vile and pessimistic lyrics (a piece of news), which is "Farewell To A Slut", entirely composed by drummer Oliver Werner. Speaking of this neglected drummer, it must be specified that although not displaying clear technique, he hits the skins with good readiness, without too many tricks, perfectly supporting the guitar tempos; then we realize that a more technical drummer would have been of little use: what's the point of a champion in such spontaneous and furious songs? Compositional talent counts as well, respect for other musicians, familiarity with life on the road. All skills that provide good drummers, providers of emotions you don't expect from certain more sponsored technique monsters. Let's see how (more or less) is "The Farewell To The Slut":

"I come home at 6 in the morning after a night of revelry/When she opens the door I vomit on her dress/She tells me I'm dirty, a loser, an idiot/A drunk loser good for nothing/She wants me to work but work tires me/All I want is a nest for my bird/Stupid bitch - I'm tired of your shit/Stupid bitch - I'll bury you in a pit/What should Hell do with such a lazy whore/Too stupid to love, ugly to fuck/Beatings and boring scoldings all night/The more it continues the worse it is/Stupid bitch - I'm tired of your shit/Stupid bitch - I'll bury you in a pit/she screams and whines all day until she drives me crazy/If she says another word, I'll make her disappear far away/I'll tear her apart, beat her with chains/I'll dissolve her in acid until she vanishes/Now I'm free in prison to drink my beers/Fucked every day by the guards for the next twenty years"

The lyrics are as brazen as the music: a tearing solo bursts forth and continues for twenty seconds, verse and chorus vie for glory, pause to catch a breath, acceleration, another testicle-tearing solo, apocalyptic sampled choirs decree the end of the story with the pestering's murder and the drunken killer's incarceration. There is room and glory for an Andy Bulgaropulos composition, the instrumental "For A Thousand Beers", which is the manifesto of the more imaginative Tankard, capable of progressing with tempo changes and more articulated solutions, without losing a bit of power but combining shorter and more intense songs with others more meditated, with consistent minutes, always with that sonic violence, that purifying in the thrash '80s style, strongly regenerated in the most unrestrained hardcore ("Puke"), keeping faith with expectations. Speaking of the two axes: from the outset, Axel Katzmann composes many more songs than Andy Bulgaropulos, but paradoxically, with Axel's departure, it will be Andy who will carry on Tankard's sound before being replaced himself. Toward the end of the festivities, there is also the rowdy cover of Gang Green's "Alcohol", with Gerre's final shout: "Give me a beer!".

The curtain falls, and the fridge door reopens: the killer of "Farewell To A Slut" dreams of it in prison.