Bands who have enduring life spans often divide opinion in their later years, usually between the diehard fans that have followed them since their early demos and the younger fans that discover them in their later work. Exodus turn 30 years old this year, and over their long and distinguished career they have released some classic albums. The older diehard fans maintain that ‘Bonded by Blood’ remains the pinnacle of their career, whereas a lot of later fans believe that ‘Shovel Headed Kill Machine’ represents a glorious new age of Bay Area thrash. I’ll admit, I lean towards the latter opinion, and not to take anything away from the legacies of the late Paul Baloff and Steve ‘Zetro’ Souza, but in this reviewer’s humble opinion, Exodus really did find their voice with Rob Dukes. This is Dukes’s fourth outing with Exodus, (although ‘Let There Be Blood’ is both unnecessary and best forgotten), and it follows up from 2007’s ‘Exhibit A: The Atrocity Exhibition’.
‘Exhibit A’, whilst a wholly competent release, lacked some of the rage and raw aggression of ‘Shovel Headed Kill Machine’; but that is back with great vengeance and furious anger on ‘Exhibit B’. From the melodic acoustic opening, ‘The Ballad Of Leonard And Charles’ kicks into life with Exodus’s trademark downtuned and simplistic thrash riffs, with Rob Dukes providing his powerful high end shouted vocals. The pace and force is immense, with Gary Holt and Lee Altus’s twin guitars delivering an irresistible broadside to the ears. The pace refuses to let up through ‘Beyond the Pale’, maintaining the formula of the tight riff into a catchier and more inventive chorus, and the customary face melting, shredding solos. Tribute is paid to Paul Baloff through the track ‘Hammer and Life’, and is a classy if slightly plodding track. ‘Class Dismissed (A Hate Primer)’ is an example of Exodus at their most destructive and full bore best, giving it both barrels and whatever else they can lay their grubby little hands on as they describe a student carrying out a Columbine style massacre, in a style as relentless and remorseless as the subject of the song. The single ‘Downfall’ seems to be a comment on U.S. foreign policy, and whilst it is a very strong song, I think there were better choices to showcase the album. It’s perhaps a good example for those who argue that Exodus have lost their way and ‘sold out’.
‘March Of The Sycophants’, like ‘Downfall’ before, lacks a little of the energy of the earlier tracks, but still carries along a decent pace and with Holt and Altus’s reliable if unspectacular riffery. It’s still going to be more than enough to kick start a good friendly violent pit though when all is said and done. The most disturbing in this collection of songs looking at ‘The Human Condition’ is without question ‘Nanking’, about the Nanking Massacre of 1937. If you’ve not heard of it, I’d urge you to look it up on Wikipedia to get a feel for the scale of the atrocities committed. It’s a slower and darker track than anything else on here and makes for an uncomfortable listen. The pace picks up for ‘Burn Hollywood Burn’, which is one of the shorter and sweeter blasts on this mammoth opus, then slows down again for ‘Democide’, which comes across like one of Slayer’s slower tracks. The intensity and quality ramp up for ‘The Sun Is My Destroyer’ which blasts away like a V8 on full song and is heavier than lead shit. Dukes adopts a deeper vocal style for the verses which suits him, and creates a bit of welcome variation. ‘A Perpetual State of Indifference’ is a two and a half minute instrumental that leads directly into ‘Good Riddance’, a blasting; energy fuelled sneering rant that warms the cockles of the heart.
‘The Human Condition’ suffers in the same way that ‘The Atrocity Exhibition’ did, in that some of the songs are just a bit too long. Ok, they are not quite as long this time around, and usually I’d say that an album that clocks in at close to 80 minutes long, especially of this quality, would represent great value for money; however by the end of the album it becomes just a bit laborious and the feeling is that this could have been an even tighter album with some creative editing. All that aside though, this is still a superb album and a substantial improvement over ‘Exhibit A’. The thing with the 80’s thrash bands is that over time, almost all of them over time made concessions to the commercial market. Exodus, despite all the various line up changes, never did, and with ‘The Human Condition’, they show no signs of letting up. This is Exodus, and they are in brilliantly brutal thrashing form.
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