Mondo Bungle

pretty efficient sounding breakneck thrash that doesn't do anything to make you hate it. It's crusty like G.I.S.M. but much cleaner, though when you play this style I think you ought to have something to set you apart from the crowd.

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The Batlord

My first impression. It just kinda sounds like any number of other basement thrash bands.

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Blarobbarg

Okay, so here are my feelings on Gore.

It was... fine. I love the early 80's haziness between subgenres- at points it was more death or even early black metal, and has that straight-ahead punk drumming. The last song was almost doom metal. That was cool.

However, as others said, it's nothing others haven't done before or since.

That said, I liked it enough to look up the band and have also listened to their only full album on Spotify (which is actually just a collection of their earliest demos and singles and such) and my goodness. It's way better than Gore.

Like, yes, it's still the same sound, but it's grittier, less produced, and just ****tier in all the best ways. They were still trying to figure themselves out, they obviously weren't mature enough to try anything, they were just bashing the hell out of their instruments and screaming into microphones in obvious mimicking of their Western hardcore and metal heroes. To me, the raw, ugly early stuff is better than Gore could ever hope to be.

So even if I'll never listen to that album again, I'm glad I listened to it, as I was introduced to a cool band I hadn't heard about before. Just listen to this terrible, amazing song. His vocals sound like he's a cat being strangled. Which is great.

Unitron

Hey, even if you didn't care for Gore much, I'm glad I was able to get someone else into Jurassic Jade, they're such an underrated band. Hizumi is indeed a great vocalist, she sounds like an absolute banshee.

My favorite release from them is probably War by Proxy (which I think is included with that compilation on Spotify), the best thrash EP after Haunting the Chapel.

This was the song that got me hooked on them, love the crashing cymbals:

Key

I'll have a review in this weekend. This is fun

MicShazam

Invocator - Excursion Demise

Reminded me a bit of Death, Dark Angel and even Sadus to some degree. Like others have said, the songs are perhaps not all that memorable, but the album sounds good and thrashes along in a satisfying manner. Not bad if you just want some meat & potatoes. I'd prefer something considerably more distinct in style, but it perfectly listenable if it's what you've got on hand.

EDIT: Listening to this again after the album below, I welcome the middle of the road sound of this album. It's nothing special, but it's got that thrash metal punch to the stomach.

Jurassic Jade - Gore

Sometimes, the vocalist is entirely too much, but there's some catchy moments in these songs. The guitar sound is incredibly crunchy and there's a lot of low end punch to the kick drums, but I still feels somewhat bothered by the production after a while. I find it a bit grating in bigger doeses.
Sometimes the album descends into high speed thrashing of the sort that a million identikit bands have done just the same. I like the moments where it feels like the band has somewhat of a musical style of its own better. Check out the intro riff to track 5, for example. I liked this album a lot to begin with, but after the first two, I gotta say I'd rather be listening to that Invocator album one more time.

Unitron

Interesting, the production is one of my favorite parts about that album. The guitar tone they get on "Not Creation but Destruction" is one of the best tones I've ever heard. It has such a unique crunch, it makes me feel like I'm ripping up Imps with the chainsaw in Doom.

SGR

Okay - as for Invocator's 'Excursion Demise' - I don't generally listen to thrash that is this heavy - but after a few listens, I started to warm up to it. The production is great - very crisp - not too muddy, but not overly polished either. Just think the bass could be a bit louder (I dub it 'Justice For All (Bass for None)' syndrome)

I will say I wish there were more melodies - with thrash metal, there always seems to be a balancing act between heaviness and melody. This album seems a little imbalanced in favor of the former - which can be enjoyable some of the time but can be tiring at others.

I'll be checking out more from Invocator in the future.

MicShazam

I used to dig around for thrash metal a lot and I found that almost all thrash metal bands go for heaviness and forget about melody. So if that's the premise of the genre, then I'd kind of want something more nasty on the sound side of things to let the heaviness thrive. Nothing worse than an unmemorable, all smashing no hooks thrash metal band with sterile Nuclear Blast label production.

The Batlord

Nah I could hear that she was probably a woman. Wasn't sure but I suspected.

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