Kreator have been a consistent force of Thrash metal madness since releasing their acclaimed debut in 1985 (Endless Pain). Following the crash in the thrash metal market during the late 1990’s into the 2000’s, I saw 2001’s ‘Violent Revolution’ as the re-energisation of Kreator, and indeed thrash metal. 2005’s Enemy of God built further on this release, but then last year ‘Hordes of Chaos’ got unleashed. I thought this was a welcomed return to form, having all the hallmarks I hold dear in music, strong vocals, good melodies and arrangements and brutal heaviness to boot and thus it earned a place in my top twenty last year.
Recorded by Moses Schneider in Berlin, the finer punishing touches were completed in London, which were the mixing duties, performed by the highly respected Colin Richardson. Kreator gives the middle finger to all their critics with their enduring energy and song writing ability, especially prevalent on the opening ‘Hordes of Chaos’ but escalates into ‘Warcurse’, ‘Escalation’ and the outstanding ‘Amok Run’. The latter starts out quite sedate, but then Mille and the boys deliver their opus, head exploding screams and powerful guitar work backed up by a thundering rhythm section; a classic track. This is a great album, it does make me chuckle when younger fans hark back to the ‘Endless Pain’ album as being the classic one, that was good for it’s time when it was released, the production matched the technology and style of the band at that time, but ‘Hordes of Chaos’ brings Kreator right up into the modern age. After 25 years of song writing, Kreator know no bounds and thankfully have increased their talents as the years have progressed.
So enough of the album, what is in “the box”? It basically includes the ‘HoC’ album in a digipack format, with new artwork and inlay layouts, that is good in itself. The CD also has enhanced videos for the tracks ‘Hordes of Chaos’ and ‘Destroy What Destroys You’. Additional paraphernalia includes a 16 page photo book by photographer Harald Hoffmann, postcards, merchandise discount vouchers and an A1 sized poster of the stunning new artwork produced for this release.
The bonus CD comes in a cardboard sleeve and contains 6 previously unreleased demo songs. What immediately strikes you is the difference in sound quality of the recording that was released, to the demo version of the track(s), take ‘Hordes of Chaos’ for example. The mixing performed on the official release certainly did the trick. The demo version is what it is, quite muddy, slightly different delivery, but complete. ‘World Without Religion’ is a demo version of ‘Escalation’ with a different arrangement. It is always nice to hear different interpretations of recorded tunes, sometimes it works and sometimes it makes you believe they had the idea nailed proper at the first attempt, not in all cases mind you. A demo of ‘Amok Run’ still gives me that outstanding track tune. Out of all of these demo tracks, the interesting sound is the drums, they sound as they did on the ‘Coma of Souls’ album all those years ago, and that was a special release also. Still concentrating on the bonus cd, 2 covers versions are present, ‘Alle Gegen Alle’ (roughly translated “All Against All”) originally by German band Slime (and if you go some web-browsing they produce some fine tunes also) and ‘You Are the Government’ by Bad Religion. Whilst I cannot comment on the Slime cover song, other than to say after a bit of digging this was the first punk band in Germany to have their debut album banned, and it’s a bloody good song, holding true to the original version. The Bad Religion cover version certainly hits the spot is you like a bit of hardcore punk and the sound of almost clean vocals from Mille for a change.
This is a damn fine package and well received, I am not convinced it is worth the price tag that some retailers are charging, up to £42 on some websites for a 2CD set, but then as a Kreator fan you have a duty to purchase this nice box set, it depends on your collective wants and needs. But in short, there is no denying ‘Hordes of Chaos’ is a strong Kreator release of massive proportions showing the band with a renewed hunger to produce some of the heaviest thrash metal around and packaged to perfection in this box set.
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