Published on May 3, 1999
One band whose work I really started to follow in the ’90s was
Overkill. Once your typical thrash-and-doom band, Bobby “Blitz”
Ellsworth and crew have evolved their sound into a tight musical
unit. While they might not have been setting the charts on fire
with works like
I Hear Black (which I haven’t listened to for some time),
the band was creating possibly their best work of their careers.
Even their last album,
From The Underground And Below, showed a lot of the
brilliance that this band has been pouring into their music over
this decade.
Into the picture steps
Necroshine, Overkill’s latest release. It stays pretty much
in the same pattern that their recent albums have. For the first
time, this becomes a problem; the overall feel of the album is,
“Been there, done that.”
The band – vocalist Ellsworth, guitsrists Sebastian Marino (who
has since announced he’s leaving the group) and Joe Comeau, bassist
D.D. Verni and drummer Tim Mallare – kick things off strongly with
the title track, a track that dares to challenge the listener by
taking more than a minute to build the song up before Ellsworth’s
vocals kick in. It is, however, one incredible ride that the band
takes the listener on. Seeing that my daughter was happily dancing
while this song was on and saying, “I like metal,” the band should
be pleased with the knowledge they have done well here. (This news,
however, is sure to break my wife’s heart, for she doesn’t like
most metal.)
There are enough good moments on
Necroshine to make it a must-have for the Overkill fan. “My
December” and “Let Us Prey” both continue the strong level of
energy the album starts with, and “Forked Tongue Kiss” is a shot of
adrenalin when the listener really needs it.
However, the formula that Overkill has used on many of its
recent albums shows some signs of age on
Necroshine, making the bulk of the album feel like deja vu.
Even after several listens to this album, I found it very hard to
get excited about songs like “Stone Cold Jesus,” “80 Cycles,” “Dead
Man” and “Revelation”. The diehard fans of Overkill, of course,
won’t find a thing wrong with these songs.
But somehow, I kind of found myself wishing that Overkill had
taken a little more of a musical challenge on
Necroshine, by breaking free of the style they’ve used with
great success and thrown all in the face of abandon. They might
have failed in that quest, but no one could have blamed them for
trying.
Necroshine still has some solid moments on the album that
make the album worth picking up, especially if you’re a big fan of
Overkill. But there are some serious warning signs that are showing
up on this album. Here’s hoping that Overkill takes heed.