Strictly old school thrash for me thanks. None of that “party on and pass the bong dude” stuff with people going mad about pizza and inflatable sharks. Thankfully I am in more than safe hands here as E-Force is the work of Eric Forrest who you should be well aware was the larynx behind Voivod in their glorious ‘Negatron,’ Phobos’ era in the mid 90’s. E-Force themselves have been around since 2001 and knocked out 4 albums previous to this one. I think the last one I heard was ‘The Curse’ back in 2014 and I am more than ready to catch up again now.
The bassist / vocalist has hooked up with guitarist Sébastien Chiffot and drummer Patrick Friedrich in France where he has been residing for some time and between them, they have constructed ten new bangers here with a bit of a surprise at the end. Its battering madness from the off with the thudding drums leading the assault of ‘Provocation.’ That voice is instantly recognisable with the throaty, elongated Rrröööaaarrrs leaping out the speakers, chunky bass and flailing guitar work power the headlong drive. Headbanging is obligatory Are we being invaded? Sci-Fi grooves and Galactican vocal parts are never far away and have us cautiously watching the skies. Alien enthusiasts are going to be in their element what with this and a new Hypocrisy album imminent but with this we are constantly going for the throat as songs like ‘Traumatised’ slap me back in time not just to Eric’s tenure in Voivod but, well let’s just say this is the ‘Ravenous Medicine’ that fans will be looking for. With ‘Hallucination’ there’s weird sounds and a slightly doomy tempo backed up by plenty of groove and one can imagine alien overlords attacking the mind prior to snatching the body. There’s no escaping, it’s damn catchy too, at least we escaped the anal probing. Laser beams fire as the takeover gathers force on ‘Hypnotic’ this is a bit like a classic sci-fi novel and proves a real page turner as it churns and stomps away with relentless force and some fiery guitar solos too.
Having well and truly scorched the earth the remnants of mankind are given pause to come out of hiding ‘Future’s Past’ and look over the devastation via gloomy acoustic guitar work and defeated sounding spoken-words. It may split the album up but is totally effective and we know that after it the mop up is going to continue till absolutely nothing is left standing and humanity is completely enslaved. There’s no shortage of mayhem left including the triple whammy of ‘Dehumanised’ with warped dub used for sonic attack, ‘Delirium’ and ‘Deranged.’ If you do make it through to the end there is a reward in the form of a further past / future shock as a storming classic of Voivod number ‘Insect’ is on hand and rest assured it’s far better than any sequels to Starship Troopers. If you need proof that thrash can still be a potent force and not all extra terrestrials are friendly this is the album for you.
(8.5/10 Pete Woods)
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