Year : 2013
Style : Thrash Metal , Groove Metal
Country : USA
Audio : 320 kbps + all scans
Size : 240 mb
Bio:
Overkill is an American thrash metal band, formed in 1980 in New Jersey. They have gone through many line-up changes, with singer Bobby "Blitz" Ellsworth and bassist D.D. Verni remaining from the original lineup. Along with Anthrax, whose one-time lead guitarist Dan Spitz was also an early member of Overkill,the band is one of the most successful East Coast thrash metal bands. The band has a notable mascot named "Chaly", a skeletal bat with a skull-like face, horns, bony wings, and green eyes. Chaly has appeared on most of their album covers.To date, Overkill has released seventeen studio albums (including an album of cover songs), three EPs and three live albums. They were one of the early thrash metal bands to sign to a major label (Atlantic Records, in 1986), but would not achieve commercial success until the popularization of the genre in the late 1980s, with their contemporaries Anthrax, Exodus, Metallica, Megadeth, Slayer and Testament. The band's most successful records are Under the Influence (1988), The Years of Decay (1989), I Hear Black (1993) and The Electric Age (2012), which debuted at No. 142, No. 155, No. 122 and No. 77 respectively on the Billboard 200 chart.As of 2006, Overkill has sold over 625,000 albums in the U.S. since the beginning of the SoundScan era and over 16 million records worldwide as of 2012.
Album:
To me, this is a "new" Overkill record despite the reality that 3 albums have been released in the meantime and we're starting to anticipate another. The reason it counts as new is because everything from Ironbound onwards counts as new in terms of style and form for these New Jersey veterans; also, because I actually have this album sitting at home and probably bought it only 3 or 4 years ago, after the time I was granted every Overkill album up to and including Immortalis. (I say granted, but I mean that I found an amazing hard drive somewhere.) Significant in drawing the line, thrash made a full comeback over the groovier ventures of the previous decade, and The Electric Age lives up to its name by raising the voltage a bit more than most of the material on either side chronologically. It still contends with my timeless Overkill niggle, which comes down to disliking heavy rhythms where more heavy riffing would do me just nicely, but I guess while D.D. Verni numbers among the quintet's ranks, it's hard to reject the bass presence and slugged-out rhythmic parts.As ever, some of the cuts are pretty hefty by thrash standards, this album sitting on the 50 minute mark and peddling 10 songs, though sensibly 2 of the longest (above 6 minutes each) reside at the front of the listen, testing patience less at the album's end. Overall, the features that mark almost every one include lurching riffing with that slamming quality of hardcore at times, some more technical guitar moments particularly on the leads, incensed vocal snarling and wailing from the inimitable Blitz, and those incredibly heavy-duty rhythms from Verni and Ron Lipnicki on drums. With the sheer weight of all the instruments, I'm actually impressed that Overkill manage to maintain a pretty quick mid-pace most of the time, since the guitars seem all blunt edges and grinding gears - the bass somehow even more so, like a tombstone being dragged shut - and, coupled with the gut punch of the drums, would absolutely cripple your average car stereo, or at the very least send an automatic warning to the police from the other side of town. Why do I mention the sonic properties of the album along with its length? Simply, those not keen on this heavyweight form of demolition had better search for more forgiving thrash from Testament, Megadeth, or Annihilator, all bands that tend to add more variety to the all-out thrashing we get on The Electric Age.Of course, much of the former paragraph refers to personal preference in your thrash metal, and despite feeling a bit bruised by Overkill's approach, I can't deny that they do a good job writing songs. The longer cuts balance between traditional riffing build-ups, manic verses, some slower atmospheric parts, plus extended lead and bridge sections that can alter the flavour of the piece midway. That's the case when 'Drop the Hammer Down' enters a series of wicked chord changes and a brief harmonized guitar section, where it sounds like Iron Maiden are fighting off weapon-wielding burglars before standing victorious for one of Dave Linsk's longer, more melodic solos. Of course, it returns to the rampant boxing match chorus soon after. Having 'Come and Get It' as the leading track proves intriguing too, not least because it mixes some of the pacier riffs with an unusual choral interlude in the middle, when it sounds like a troop of ancient soldiers preparing for battle - a brief power metal oddity in a field of raging thrash. Other moments that particularly stand out include the manic heightening of '21st Century Man' during much of its length, the catchier brevity of 'Black Haze', and the tender clean guitar that opens 'Good Night' only to explode into the kind of anthem that appeared on Horrorscope.Although in the scope of their career The Electric Age probably didn't seem like a certain step, Overkill's trajectory over the past decade proves that this extremely solid album roughly represents the peak performance of the "new" era due to gradually diminishing returns from a similar formula ever since. Rarely in doubt is the band's ability to keep the intensity going across a 50-60 minute album, yet some of the releases from the group make such length unnecessary, something that the recording in questions suffers less from, though suffers from all the same. Personally, trimming a few songs by a minute or more would make me more appreciative of the hard-hitting exhibition, largely because the amount of repetition necessary to conventional thrash song structure reduces the impact of any idea, however good. Certainly that's the case with the lengthy yet straightforward 'All Over But the Shouting', which might have been held back along with 'Save Yourself', even if the absence of the latter would rob us of a gnarly bass solo introducing the guitar solo. Generally speaking, The Electric Age is charged with energy and potency, selling itself well as one of Overkill's finest recent efforts.
Line Up:
Bobby “Blitz” Ellsworth – Vocals
D.D. Verni – Bass, Backing Vocals
Dave Linsk – Lead Guitar, Backing Vocals
Derek Tailer – Rhythm Guitar, Backing Vocals
Ron Lipnicki – Drums
Tracklist:
CD1:
01. Come and Get It 06:17
02. Electric Rattlesnake 06:19
03. Wish You Were Dead 04:19
04. Black Daze 03:55
05. Save Yourself 03:43
06. Drop the Hammer Down 06:25
07. 21st Century Man 04:12
08. Old Wounds, New Scars 04:11
09. All Over but the Shouting 05:30
10. Good Night 05:36
CD2: Live from OZ (EP) (2013)
01. Horrorscope
02. Long Time Dyin'
03. Necroshine
04. Walk through Fire
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