Infernal Thrashing Holocaust

Point one: The production is not nearly as bad as everyone says it is. Everything is audible and the mixing is adequate. There are hundreds of albums, and probably hundreds of thrash albums, with much worse production than this one. Complaints about it are silly.

Point two: This is nowhere near as fast as people are proclaiming. Dark Angel were going faster than this back in '86, and numerous other bands such as Sodom and Kreator regularly FEEL faster than this music. I don't typically like thrash as a rule, but I do like it when it feels completely unhinged and unrestrained. Fastkill plays thrash by the rules; it's fast but not too fast, and overall it just feels like they could be doing a great deal more with what they have than they do.

'Infernal Thrashing Holocaust' has ensnared a great number of people in the metal scene for reasons I don't fully understand; perhaps I got something different than they did on the CD, but when I play it all I here is pretty average, plain thrash metal that doesn't capture my interest for even the sub-half hour running time it lasts. Riffs, vocals, and drums are all exceedingly average in both composition and delivery, and not even attempted atmospheric touches like the opening intro go beyond 'well, that's nice I guess'.

I don't know if I'm missing something huge here or if it's really just as plain as it seems, which would be very disappointing as other opinions on the album led me to believe this would be up there with Besieged or Invasion as a new thrash band I would really enjoy. Unfortunately, there's just not much here. I suppose if you like mildly brutal thrash this would be up your alley, as it is heavier than, say, Anthrax, but to anyone else who's more involved in extreme metal this is entirely skippable.