First things first: Here's the new Anthrax! They didn't change their name! Fuck you, terrorists! Folks, it simply needed to be said.
That out of the way, I absolutely love albums like this from
bands that have been around for a while.
No pandering to current trends, no "hope you enjoy our new
direction", no sounding humbled by not playing the enormo-domes of decades
past, none of that noise. In its place:
quality music, written and performed in the style and spirit of the group's
salad days. This may just end up being
one of the easiest reviews of the year: if hearing a new album from Anthrax
sounds like something you'd enjoy doing in 2011, proceed without caution: Worship Music delivers the goods. The band are tight, the songs and
arrangements honed to perfection, and I think I like returning vocalist Joey
Belladonna's voice better now than I did way back when; age has taken the shrill
quality from the top end of his range, and his control has improved
immeasurably since the Persistence of Time
days. The band's ability to swing
between silly and serious lyrical matter without sounding forced on either end
of the spectrum remains intact as well: both the emotionally heavy "In the
End" and the utterly ridiculous, zombie-killing nonsense of "Fight
'Em Til You Can't" rank among the high points of a very consistent album.
And that's it.
Really, there's no point in my going into any further detail: if you
still harbor a sweet tooth for '80s metal, non-glam division, Worship Music will give you good reason
to rejoice. If not, it's an album that
wastes no time trying to sucker you in with any sort of gimmicks. That's the beauty of the thing, actually.
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