Onslaught are one of the great success stories in the resurgence of British thrash. After the disappointing response to 1989’s ‘In Search Of Sanity’ they ended up on hiatus for 18 years before returning with a force that levelled everything in their path. ‘Killing Peace’ remains in my humble opinion one of the finest thrash albums of the noughties, and 2011’s ‘Sounds of Violence’ wasn’t too shabby either. Therefore the bar is set very high and expectations for their sixth studio album, imaginatively titled ‘VI’, are such that I took the precaution to remove fragile objects from the room (such as ornaments, pets and wives), before hitting the play button on this one. If the lads were going to stay true to their 2nd wave form, this was bound to be brutal.
After a brief light intro things kick off in suitably violent fashion with ‘Chaos Is King’, with Onslaught displaying all the menace and destructive force that has served them so well over the years. The fast, punchy riffing is in the vein of later Exodus as Nige Rockett and Andy Rosser-Davies once again prove that they are one of the strongest guitar pairings in metal. Also immediately noticeable is the drumming which is tighter than ever courtesy of former Desecration & Extreme Noise Terror man Michael Hourihan. Steve Grice always done a fine job in the past but Mr Hourihan really does crank things up a level on the professional battery front. It is the charismatic frontman of Onslaught though that really has elevated them over the years, and on ‘VI’ Sy Keeler shows that he has not mellowed in the slightest. Still delivering every line with a healthy (or maybe that should be unhealthy) dose of venom and spite he provides the perfect voice to lead the musical assault. The one criticism here is that he doesn’t seem to use his impressive range quite as much as in the past, sticking with straight ahead aggression rather than mixing things up by exploring the higher ranges.
After starting the album in such a devastating fashion on ‘Chaos Is King’ it was always going to be difficult to maintain that sort of momentum and as a result the remaining songs suffer slightly purely on the basis of the hard act they have had to follow. On their own merit though, every song on ‘VI’ is a good one and all identifiably Onslaught without being too formulaic. The addition of a female backing vocal on ‘Children of the Sand’ is welcome even if it does go for a very generic Middle Eastern sound to compliment a song about the precariously unstable nature of the area and the part that religion plays in its fragility. I admit to cringing massively at ‘66Fuckin6’ on the first time I listened to it as it managed to cover every lazy metal cliché in the book; but when you factor in Onslaught’s infectious energy and the catchiness of their songwriting it becomes not only perfectly acceptable, but big dumb fun at the same time.
The success of Onslaught’s revival was based on a simple combination of aggression, tight musicianship and riffs that hook you and hang on for dear life, and there has been no reason to alter a winning formula. Whilst this doesn’t quite live up to the destructive excellence of ‘Killing Peace’ it does stand very strongly alongside ‘Sounds of Violence’. With a band like this you don’t expect innovation or originality, you just expect good friendly violent fun, and Onslaught deliver that by the truckload.
(8.5/10 Lee Kimber)
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