Released on: 27th April 2018
Thrash metallers Black Cyclone originally formed in 2009 and have only recently brought out their debut album. It is said that good things come to those who wait and this certainly holds true in the case of Death is King. As an unrelenting cavalcade of focused riffs battling like the sky is on fire the first album is intensely brutal.
Yet as savage and fierce as the album is it never falters from being a fun frolic through bestial harmonies that inspire a good bit of head banging. With the guitar working at breakneck speeds to harness the unfathomable power that comes with the territory of thrash metal music. However it is not just with good pacing and impressive layering that the band form their potent sound. There are a good bunch of solos’ to carry the riffs to conclusion.
Having only released two demos prior to this album, in 2013 and 2014 respectively, and within a different genre Black Cyclones’ black metal roots are still visible in their musical vocabulary. The group has only translated the energy from one genre to another but the atmospheric posturing brings an extra dimension of metal to the concentrated ferocity on display.
Death is King is not just loaded with technical wizardry as it has a great amount of feeling coursing through its thirty-six minute runtime. With cheesy choruses and verbose verses this debut is a mean tribute to the might of heavy metal.
8/10
