Album Reviews : Kreator – Hordes of Chaos

Kreator are one of three thrash metal bands which dominated the Germany metal scene in the early 80’s. The other two being Sodom and Destruction.

Many fans in the United States at the time were very familiar with the thrash metal movement, as the genre exploded with bands like Megadeth, Overkill, Metallica, Anthrax and Testament.

Sadly though, the recognition that Kreator deserved wasn’t until the late 80’s when the band finally toured the United States and gained massive popularity over their fourth album, “Extreme Aggression“.

While many thrash metal bands in the early 90’s were changing their style to suite a more mainstream audience, Kreator continued to reinvent their sound by incorporating more melodic and death metal influences into repertoire.

20 years on, the band are still going strong with many of the original members still baring the mark of the bands conception.

Kreator bring forth their new thrash metal onslaught, “Hordes of Chaos“. The album continues the bands traditional thrash elements, with the entire album recorded in an analog format, with very minor tweaks and overdubs.

This somewhat “outdated” recording process has given new light to not only the bands style, but also is a breath of fresh air compared to many of the other thrash metal bands around today who seem to play it safe, and continue to use techniques that please a mainstream musical trend.

The album flows exceptional well, with tracks that reign a barrage of assaults to the senses. The opening track “Hordes of Chaos (A Necrologue for the Elite)” is a fitting start to the album, with Mille Petrozza‘s growling vocals and wielding ax work setting an eerie tone to the songs angst-ridden theme.

“Destroy What Destroys You” shows off the bands exceptional musicianship with both Sami Yli-Sirniö and Mille Petrozza dueling their formidable guitar work, while Jürgen Reil thrashes out some nice chunky drumming.

“Corpse of Liberty” pulls back a lot of the aggression, and anarchy throughout the album and encompasses a melodic instrumental undertone. Christian Giesler‘s bass work is just fantastic, I really enjoyed this one.

The artwork of ‘Hordes of Chaos‘ is very familiar to the bands previous albums. We a treated to yet another piece of artwork that depicts a tormented and disfigured face. This face on the new album however bares an uncanny resemblance to H.R. Giger‘s haunted and surreal artwork, more so on the digipak version.

All in all, the album seems to tick all the usual boxes of a great Kreator album. You’ll be hard pressed to find any flaw with this album as it just screams pure adrenaline, aggression and speed – something of which has been missing lately in the thrash metal world. 8/10

Band: Kreator
Album: Hordes of Chaos
Year: 2009
Genre: Thrash Metal
Label: SPV (Steamhammer)
Origin: Essen, Germany
www.myspace.com/officialkreator

Tracklisting:

1. Hordes of Chaos (A Necrologue for the Elite) (Reviewer’s Choice)
2. Warcurse
3. Escalation
4. Amok Run
5. Destroy What Destroys You
6. Radical Resistance
7. Absolute Misanthropy
8. To the Afterborn
9. Corpses of Liberty
10. Demon Prince