Destruction - Born to Perish (2019)

It's amazing to think that we're already nearing two decades of the Destruction 'reunion' period, that is to say the new material being produced after The Least Successful Human Cannonball debacle, with the two main members of the band getting back on the same page and deciding to kick the world's ass ad infinitum, while other aged thrashers seem almost lazy in comparison to such an endless parade of productivity. That isn't to say that, musically speaking, they've been the envy of the genre since the new millennium. They peaked this new, furious thrashing attack and its production style back in 2001 on The Antichrist, and since that point have been sort of replicating that record with only minor variations in personnel, studio mixing and songwriting quality, even going so far as to put out two collections of re-recorded early material that sounds similar with the new era's material.

To be fair, all of these newer records have passed muster to the degree that they provide the anger, energy and Schmier's irresistible snarls their audience might seek. They never really shot any blanks, the sonic spunk concentration just receded for about 15 years. None of them were duds for me, but neither were they as exceptional as listening through The Antichrist again, or their earlier run of records throughout the 80s, which still feel more fresh and alluring than much of this ironclad, post industrial apocalyptic thrashing phase. Spiritual Genocide was my favorite of the later lot, and I was in the minority there, but it felt like it had the most outside influence going into it, perhaps a few shades of Schmier's beloved side project Headhunter. But I'm happy to say that Born to Perish is consistently firing off some of their strongest material in the last 18 years. Sure, it's not reinventing anything they haven't already been releasing over these last couple decades, but I feel it just has the best balance of memorable riffs, dynamics and musicianship of the lot. Whereas a bunch of the last 5-6 albums could all be thrown in a blender, with their track lists mixed up and you wouldn't always know the difference, here I find a lot more replay value.

Now a four-piece, the performances here are all exceptional. Mike's rhythm guitars still sound like beefy razors cutting down the opposition on a rusted landscape, with Swiss string-slinger Damir Eskic peppering on a bunch of spry and searing leads that add some character to the proceedings, a glaze of electric atmosphere, rather than just feeling obligatory. Even when they some cleaner bits like the intro to "Butchered for Life", they flow rather well and don't get upstaged once the distortion is cranked on. The bass lines are fat and potent, occasionally disappearing into Mike's power picking vortex but given some parts where they can stand alone. Skin-bashing legend Randy Black of Annihilator and Primal Fear makes his debut behind the Germans' kit, and he makes it sound effortless as he just rifles away, though I couldn't say I felt much of a difference from Vaaver's beats, but then again that's probably a good thing. There is no interruption of service on this album, if you've been enjoying the riff styles and general level of competence and professionalism that the band has maintained since All Hell Breaks Loose, then it's all par for the course.

All of the songs are decent if not outright fun, and while many of the rhythm guitar riffs can feel like they're paraphrased or disassembled and reassembled from older material, Damir's airier guitars actually go a long way in helping them feel slightly renewed. "Betrayal", "Rotten", "We Breed Evil" and "Fatal Flight 17" are probably some of those I was most magnetized towards, but they're not a whole lot more potent than their neighbors, so this is an album I have no problem sitting straight through for 50 minutes when I'm in the mood. The cover of Tygers of Pan Tang's "Hellbound" is appreciated, keeping its original heavy metal spirit, but given a little more thrust as its transformed just enough into the Destruction canon to earn its existence away from the original. Then again, Schmier is no newcomer to the style, having taken part in Panzer and Headhunter to great success. Overall, this was a very fun surprise to fuel me through the mid-to-late summer weeks, I wouldn't say it was some exceptional thrash album, but it's easily proof that the Germans' music still has some value to it nearly four decades into their career, much like their formidable peers Kreator and Sodom.

Verdict: Win [8.25/10]

https://www.destruction.de/