Maximum Metal Rating Legend

Early Man Death Potion Company: Myspace Music Release: 2010 Genre: Thrash Reviewer: EC

Fast and intense metal

Damn there is metal everywhere. Actually let me rephrase that...there is damn good metal everywhere. Bands all over the globe have popped up and taken the bull by the horn, delivering quality goods that borrow from the old, inject youthful energy and then go on to inspire the bands they borrowed from in the first place. Think of all the new thrash bands that have come along and inspired the old timers to get back on stage and into the studio. Once defunct acts like Forbidden, Xentrix, Laaz Rockit and Artillery are back at it again based on the popularity their genre is now experiencing.

Enter Early Man.

These New Yorkers impressed me five years ago with their debut album "Closing In". The band was basically a two-piece act but managed to squeeze together eleven solid tracks that brought the old sensations back again. Often a big swooping Black Sabbath riff would permeate the air quickly followed by a manic thrash riff ripped right out of 1983 and delivered to the masses with today's technology. Long overdue, Early Man have now entered the foray again albeit this time as a four piece act. "Death Potion" picks right up after "Closing In" and brings a more refined sound that still is draped in metal mythos.

These guys are very Anvil like at times, almost a caustic vision to deliver fast and intense metal that is somewhat Neanderthal when you sit and ponder the overall sound. Still it is those fast, tight and punked up riffs that are the driving power here. God...listen to the title track, just a raging fest of NWOBHM crossed with Anvil's sense or purpose (or lack thereof). The band just go completely Bay Area thrash on "Someone Else's Nightmare" (Killing them all in fact) yet still dipping way back to the mid 70s with Priest-like "Kildrone" and instrumental "Through Chemtrails". Favorite cut here is "The Undertaker Is Calling You", a scorching cut that recalls something Martin Popoff once wrote about Manowar's "Hail To England": this is a reason to rise and exist each day.