Bombs Away!

Without any faking or flattering I have to admit that I got pretty interested in this band when I first heard about them several years ago. They started their career as an Iron Maiden tribute band named Afterlife, and when that team parted ways out of its ashes came Space Eater, led by Boškom Radišić and Stanislav Šaršanski. This team also features Karlo Testen on bass, second guitarist Nemanja Pavlović and drummer Vladimir Bogdanović, third in a row that ended behind the battery of Space Eater. Three songs ended up on this demo recording that was recorded during November and December last year (2005) in Radio Belgrade’s Studio 6. There’s the title track, then ‘Merciful Angel’ and the third one named after band, ‘Space Eater’. Before this release the band recorded another demo also in Studio 6, and it was recorded live, I think for the purposes of Demo masters tournament organized by Radio Belgrade 202, but still this is the first real, official studio demo. Band is presented with its thrash metal, which is very much influenced by thrash bands of the second half of the 80’s, like Heathen, Razor, Laaz Rockit, and Intruder. This influence can be felt in Radišić's vocal delivery, as well as the rest of the band’s playing, which is not that technically demanding, but you can still feel the vibe of the mentioned bands. The production work is somewhat poor and didn’t bring out the full musical potential of the band and I somehow feel that Studio 6 isn’t the most suitable one for metal. But, considering that this is a demo recoding, you can see pass the production part, hoping that the next demo will be better produced. From the offered tracks, the catchy title track, which is the best one on the demo, comes into first plan. It has a very catchy riff and its arrangement is rather energetic, so you can expect a real head banging song. The second track, ‘Merciful Angel’, is really good, has some power metal parts, so it somewhat reminds me of Cirith Ungol’s early works, and the slower part has a vibe like acoustic part of Iced Earth’s ‘Curse The Sky’. Besides, this is the song that has the best lyrics and Karlo’s bass has a lot of interesting lines. For the end there’s ‘Space Eater’ that has a “clap your hands” kind of beginning and develops into untamed old school thrash riffs and galloping cannonade of the rhythm section, it presents the band’s real anthem.

Lyrics for it are similar to Intruder and early Gamma Ray, although the title itself associates to such thematic. Generally speaking, lyrics are solid, perhaps ‘Bombs Away’ has some more simply structured lyrics, but I believe that it was more about music in that one than the lyrical form. It’s a pity that ‘Afterlife’, featured on the previous live recording, didn’t find its way to this CD, but what can you do. On the presented songs there’s some job left to be done on solos that, compared to furious rhythmic structures of the songs, don’t sound as untamed and convincing. Perhaps the solo is best expressed in the title track, while they are not so noticeable on the remaining tracks. Besides audio part, this CD features a video, recorded on last years “Gitarijada”, where ‘Bombs Away’ is captured. Video is of good quality, although it was recorded for TV airing, but the cutting of shots and nearly unstoppable switching from one focus to another is irritating. The song is dynamic and the band looks very moving on stage, but camera job is, objectively speaking, boring. Good thing that this isn’t the official video…

Among flaws of this demo there’s cover art, which was done by a certain Dutchman named Mic Jansen. The drawing is done in ink, but in ink pencils and altogether looks very bad. If the guy is up to 15-16 years old than it can be forgiven, but if he’s over 20, eh… honestly speaking, cover looks much better in small resolution. Too much lines and shadowing smother the entire idea and because of that band’s logo is more apparent than Jansen’s artwork. Although this is a demo, nowadays the visual appearance of the album is also important, so much so that people get more attracted by cover than music, especially if these guys mean to do something abroad; then they’ll have to find someone more effective. Lyrics to all three tracks are printed on the back of the inlay card and there’s info about the album, thanks list and band’s web page. On the back of the disc there’s a picture of the band and track listing. The inside of the inlay card is empty, although it could have been used for another picture or biography.

All in all, the entire impression is very positive. Space Eater is a healthy band, whose musicians aren’t some technicians, but this kind of retro approach to thrash primacy from the 80’s is very much needed on today’s domestic scene, though there aren’t some more direct thrash acts. It’s true that there are old gangs like Rapid Force or Bombarder, or younger bands like Nadimač and Kuga, but they aren’t too active, so Space Eater for the time being takes the front line in the thrash sphere. But, besides all that, there’s a question of how many of the younger audience can embrace it, considering that most high school kids sees metal through the prism of fashion postulates and passing trend. There’s the older audience, but they’re seemingly slowly losing interest… so the focus should definitely be on younger generations and motivating them towards metal music.

Nevertheless, this band does divert attention their way with this release, perhaps not as big to release a real full-length tomorrow, since they have to work on defining their sound, but their further development should be followed.


Vladimir Petkovic
(Metal Sound Magazine-Serbia)
http://www.metal-sound.net
http://www.myspace.com/vladimirpetkovic

*Originally written by my modicum on Serbian Language, for Serbian Metal Sound Magazine, no.2. Original Serbian version was translated on English at http://www.,space-eater.com