Susperia: Attitude

09/06/09   ||   Euthanatos

Holy shit, man, Susperia! I haven’t heard anything by this band since their debut in 2001. They sound quite different from what I remember them, I actually think they sound a lot better, but I did miss two albums which Zach and Duff thought were pretty cool, so take my opinion with a grain of salt here.

First things first, love the production, fellas, absolutely love it. The guitar sound is crunchy as fuck, the vocals sound awesome, somewhere between an aggressive heavy metal to a light thrash metal scream, something like Testament meets Running Wild. The drum-sound is also killer, and by Jove, former Dimmu/Old Man’s Child drummer Tjodalv sure has some wicked karate chops. Nothing too extreme, but really tasteful playing here.

The overall sound Susperia go for these days is still some sort of modernized thrash/death ensemble, if that makes any sense. The riffs are absolutely to die for (which was a gay goth band, incidentally), and the song structures stay full-on aggressive 100% of the time, even when Athera goes into power metal mode and the band decides to go easy, it never sounds faggish. Faggly. Fagness. I don’t know which term to use, but you get the point.

I was actually going to make a whole paragraph about how Athera just needs to distance himself from the huge influence that Chuck Billy is on his singing, and lo-and-fucking-behold, Chuck Billy actually makes a guest appearance (as does Shagrath, but who the fuck cares about that cunt). Now, you just can’t beat that and makes my point entirely moot. All praise to Athera for his great range, though, his singing is top-notch.

While Susperia often gets thrown into the same bag of melodic death metal bands, I think that’s a totally unfair assessment of them. These guys are much more creative and have a sound all of their own. This is a solid piece of work, an all-around fun album to listen to without compromise.

The cover: A weird mouth-face person. Love it.

8 dario argentos out of 10.

http://www.globaldomination.se/reviews/susperia-attitude

Attitude is already the fifth full-length by Norwegian thrash metallers Susperia, but to me it was first visit to the band’s world. So I can’t tell if the band has changed their style or if Attitude is their best album or not, but what I can tell you is that Attitude is the best fucking new thrash metal album I have heard in years, man! There is not a weak song here. The riffs are so crushing and the vocal melodies are so incredibly catchy, that it’s very easy to adore the album already on the very first listen.

Speaking of vocal melodies brings us to the singer Athera (Pål Mathisen). Comparing him to an average metal singer is the same thing as comparing a small toy caterpillar with the load and haul machine Toro 2500E (aka “Rohjo”). Damn this Athera dude sounds pissed off, just like a good thrash metal singer should.

The drums could be from a progmetal album. There’s a home task for you; count how many different drum patterns Tjodalv (Kenneth Åkesson) plays and how many rhythm changes there are on the album. Fantastic drum work indeed.

I will come to your nightmares, if you don’t get this gem.