more mainstream press biging up the return of rageing:


guardian blog:

Thrash was no flash in the pan

According to NME, thrash metal is back. Really? I don't remember it ever going away.
Ben Myers



According to a variety of sources - including NME and Vice magazine - thrash metal is back, back, back!

OK, you can groan now. Groan like a concertina that has just been thrown down a refuse shaft. Why? Because to anyone with the remotest interest in heavy metal there is nothing worse than being told that it's OK to like your music again.

It was John Peel who once pointed out that heavy metal is to the British what country and western is to our American counterparts: an unfaltering, largely unchanging genre that is beloved by millions across the less-hip heartland; one which exists regardless of outside forces such as changing fashions or trends or, indeed, the business end of music. Simply put: it's always there and no matter who else comes along in the meantime. Like Dolly Parton, Black Sabbath will be selling albums for years to come.

A case in point: with little self-aggrandisement, Kerrang! has been out-selling NME for some time now, suggesting that music fans are more interested in reading about the wanton brutality of Trivium or the Moby Dick-quoting Mastodon than they are the po-faced mumblings of The Kooks or The View. It's not an age or generational thing either - all still in their early 20s, Trivium have already shifted millions of albums, largely to teenagers.

Thrash, then, is one extreme strand of metal and, despite what the style mags tell us, has been popular for 25 years now - even though when the big four (in order of greatness: Slayer, Anthrax, Metallica and Megadeth) imposed themselves on the headbanging masses circa 1986, they were met with suspicion and derision from certain conservative quarters of the hard rock community.

Actually, the good thrash bands (let's also include Suicidal Tendencies, Overkill, Kreator, Testament, Sepultura, DRI, Nuclear Assault and
Annihilator) played faster, harder and better than many of their predecessors. They understood the need for new extremes and were often more open-minded to musical cross-pollination and collaboration: Anthrax teamed up with Public Enemy for a genre-defining song and a subsequent tour, while Slayer's Kerry King played guitar for the Beastie Boys' (You Gotta) Fight For Your Right (To Party) and recorded for (then) hip-hop label Def Jam.

Thrash's sartorial style may have been garish, painfully macho, comical and a threat to the wearer's reproductive organs, but it was, in its own way, as colourful as nu rave and, like mod, punk or acid house, unambiguous in its musical allegiances. Metal fans know they look ridiculous and that the bands are often ludicrous, but that's kind of the point.

And now, thanks to new bands such as Municipal Waste and Liverpool's SSS, old school thrash is gaining attention. Critics will no doubt dismiss any so-called comeback as purely the domain of teenage boys, while - again - completely missing the point. (Of course it's for teenage boys - although I know women in their 30s, 40s and beyond who are into it too.) The real point is this: there is no thrash comeback, it's always been around - it's just that publications need to consolidate scenes to sell papers.

There are tonnes of great heavy bands out there and have been as long as I can remember. You can even laugh along with them (or, in the case of Metallica, at them) if you like - because this music is, after all, about abandonment, release, drama, volume, fun and getting down.

gamabomb wrote:Metal fans know they look ridiculous and that the bands are often ludicrous, but that's kind of the point.

See Jamie, I told you Slayer were hilarious.

I like that article, it says what I've (and I imagine everyone on here too) always felt, and why it always annoys me when people say "Metal is coming back" or even when idiot rock bands who think they're good say "We're bringing metal back!!!1!1111", because metal has always been there and, for the real fans at least, it indeed never has gone, or will go, away.

Nice.

The dude who wrote it seems to have a good handle on his thrash, and he's exactly right. Music doesn't disappear, it just dips out of a certain area of focus. I''ve got tunes by Scatman, Charles And Eddie and Dokken on my iPod - and they're hardly popular. Rightly so, actually.
Still, hazzah for more coverage.

A popular newspaper covering metal with a writer who has his head screwed on right? I like it!

Holy Crap! Lions! wrote:A popular newspaper covering metal with a writer who has his head screwed on right?

Thats unpossible!.

But yeh the dude does a decent job of it.

fuckin'ell thats wicked

Destruction wrote:

Holy Crap! Lions! wrote:A popular newspaper covering metal with a writer who has his head screwed on right?

Thats unpossible!.

Nice word.
Anyway,great article

SSS did a gig in brighton and hit up some film spots. this article in the guardian on 4/08/07 had salford lads club, zigy stardusts telephone box and quadrophenia showed its head. always carry a marker with yer. even better how we in article down as "555 liverpool thrash"

Good article. I bet the reason they say Thrash is Back is because they had no idea it never left. These retards are unaware at all of the fucking underground scene!

Very good article indeed. I like it when writers write about what they know rather than just making a fool of themselves.

Thanks for posting, that was a good read. First thing I've seen in paper that was interesting.

thats a great article by usual mainstream standards!

Ah impressive! The Guardian isn't a bad paper really, and they tend to get people who know what they are talking about to write for it, hence here.

Although his opinion of the top four in greatness is all wrong...

Yeah, mine is actually the reverse of that lol. Good article, and again more coverage is more potential fans.

thrashduck wrote:Although his opinion of the top four in greatness is all wrong...

agreed

saying slayer were better than metallica and megadeth must be a joke