Bienvenidos a mi reino

LETHAL – BIENVENIDOS A MI REINO

Back in the late 80´s and early 90´s, Argentina had a wide and respectful thrash metal scene. We had Militia, Hammer, Chacal, Schizophrenia, Velocet, Nepal, Hermetica, Horcas and the band I’m about to review, Lethal.

1990´s “Bienvenidos A MI Reino” marks the debut of the one of the best bands of thrash of our nation. In this album the band shows lyrics written and performed in Spanish while others are in English. Ultra-thin production and of course ultra-thin guitar sound and messy drum beats.

This album can easily be catalogued as a collage of riffs, riffs and many more riffs. This album does not have 412 riffs like "Warriors" but we can well say that it has about 270 more or less. Pulling off pretty well almost every thrash technique and cliché; tremolo, triplet, fast power-chord and palm mute alternation in the average Thrash Metal way, more in the way of Anthrax and Flotsam & Jetsam than any other band.

We have “Rompiendo El Silencio” which is an absolute riff monster with the absolute best performance by Tito Garcia ever on any Lethal album. His high-pitched screams sound so alike King Diamond, that it instantly owns you. The riffs of the verse are excellent but the cream of the crop are the underlying chorus riffs. Next is “Ultimo Sobreviviente” starts off pretty decently in a slow and acoustic fashion but then at 0:36 the beast is unleashed and the riffs come out

“Lethal Command” is another riff onslaught; if I’m not mistaken 25 different riffs are performed during this song. WOW! And then, we have that interactive and catchy chorus “Attack, lethal command!”.
The only minor setback is “King Of The Ring” which is not bad. But it certainly isn’t up to par with the future version done by the band in 1993 on the album “Maza”.

“Acid Dream” and “Prefabricated News” are both pretty efficient. The former starts out acoustically and then morphs into a pretty effective mid-paced thrash number, and the latter is a textbook straightforward thrash number with some effective hooks and nice gang vocals.

Finally comes off the title track and absolute king of gallops. It starts off with a Slayer-esque lead work and then it brings the gallops and brings them really hard, and what about the chorus? The motherfucking catchiest chorus on the album.

Conclusion: So, when all is said and done. This is a fundamental album for every South American thrasher or people obsessed with this type of thrash metal.