Força Macabra / Armagedom

Here's a great pairing of two bands from different sides of the planet, but playing a similar style of music. It's a potent mix of Ratos De Porao-styled crusty fury with the speed and aggression of Hirax-style thrash. Both bands include a liberal dose of Discharge.

Forca Macabra are from Finland. They are such rabid fans of the Brazilian HC scene that they sing in Portuguese. They play thrash in the Finnish style: fast and heavy, but you can clearly hear the Brazilian influence. In fact, I think their songs are a perfect blend of metal and hardcore, like Riistetyt and Sepultura in a blender. The recording is thick and powerful and really complements their thrashing riffs. Even though there's a lyric sheet, you don't really need it. Taurus has a clear shouting style like Anti-Cimex or Entombed.

The Armagedom tracks were recorded in 1989, so the sound quality is a little less clear than the Forca Macabra tracks. They make up for that with some tight riffs played at a much faster pace and with a higher metal content. They were definitely influenced by old Slayer or Destruction. The singer even throws in some Tom Araya-style high notes in a couple of songs. The drums stick to a nice D-beat throughout most of their songs, which leaves plenty of room for their guitarist to go crazy with odd riffs and schizophrenic solos.

Armagedom has a few more releases that are also worth checking out. Forca Macabra is a much more prolific band, though a lot of their material was released only on vinyl. If you're lucky, you can find some of their Brazilian CDs which compile their rarer output. This CD is definitely a good place to start. Hopefully extreme music has come full circle enough that today's fans can recognize yesterday's brilliance.