Midnight. A one man nasty, sleazy, blackened, blasphemous thrash band from the apparent spiritual home of dirty metal – Cleveland, Ohio. If you’re not familiar with Midnight already, think Venom playing Motorhead covers while smashed on JD, beer and a nose full of the devil’s dandruff. In fact if you’re not familiar with Midnight this here compilation is as good a place as any to start.
While not approaching the sheer volume of product and obscurity of say, Nunslaughter’s back catalogue (both hands share a similar grubby speed metal vibe) Midnight’s discography is a long and complicated litany of sex, Satan and punk lunacy most of which can be pretty hard to come by. If you’re a Midnight devotee then you’ll know exactly what to expect here and if not, well as stated it’s a good springboard into the masked man’s depraved vision of metallic excess.
Now, ‘Shox Of Violence’ is a four track EP consisting of all new material available on 12” vinyl. It is also available on CD or cassette (what is it with this obsession with cassette releases of late?) with 25 tracks….. yep….25. On top of the four new songs you get pretty much all the split / ep tracks released since their classic debut album “Satanic Royalty”.
The new tracks are titled “Death Scream”, “Who Gives A Fuck?” – this is pure punk magnificence, “Ready For Destruction” and…. song title of the month…… “Groin Gripper”. All follow the Midnight blueprint of raw, hook-laden, riff driven malevolence and are killer.
The bonus material on the CD / cassette includes, among some live & demo material two Venom covers – “In League With Satan” & “Too Loud For The Crowd” which are ripping especially the former! A Quiet Riot cover (and it’s not the obvious one), four covers of songs by The Spits and a cover of “Watch Your Step” by Girlschool. All performed with conviction and all as raw as it gets.
Definitely worth picking up and blasting when you wanna snort blow off a nympho nun’s cleavage.
(8.5/10 Mark Eve)
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