Review Summary: What the hell is this.
Norway isn't a country known for thrash, instead being more famous for Viking metal, black metal and death metal. However, there is one band there that truly stands out as being rather awesome, and that is Desekrator. Their 1998 album, Metal For Demons is a surprisingly good album that combines a wide range of vocal styles with some decent guitar riffs, killer leads, a strong drummer and some rather lo-fi production. This album has somewhat of a black metal feel to it, whilst having the drumming and guitar work of thrash, and the opening track sounding almost like early Judas Priest.
The vocal work on here is fairly diverse, with their being numerous styles showcased throughout. Texas Joe has a very stereotypical American country accent to it, which never fails to amuse me given that the band is Norwegian. The title track has a Screaming For Vengeance-era Rob Halford vocal delivery to it, and many of the other tracks have some black metal vocals. This is one of the real strengths of the album. The drumming is also varied enough, with the slower bands being creative enough, and the faster beats being clearly Venom influenced. The guitar work is the strength of this album, however, with some of the leads being extremely well done, especially the one that signals for the start of the second half of Texas Joe and the lead work to Aphice. The riff work is nothing too special, but gets its job done, taking the listener on a journey.
The main weakness of this album is that the band do not know how to get their songs from A to B, leaving great gaping holes in the middle of their songs where they stop playing altogether. This gives the album a very amateur, disjointed feel to it and takes away from the obvious prowess possessed by the members of the band. The transitions in the songs are just too poorly written to have any real sense of integrity.
This album is a decent enough album, without doing anything too special. The lead work is outstanding, but the transitions detract too much from the album for it to ever threaten the heavy hitters. This is also a band that is suffering from an identity crisis, with some songs being pure black metal, but some being thrashing numbers, to the point it is a debate as to which category this band fits into.
