Review Summary: Sacred Reich's debut is by far the most heavy and intense album in their discography.
Sacred Reich had a righteous, youthful fire in their belly when they first started out. Led by bassist, vocalist, lead songwriter and lyricist Phil Rind, Sacred Reich's specialty was at first typical angry thrash metal with typical horror-inspired lyrics about subjects like vampires, before quickly branching out into politically inspired lyrics and more accessible thrash metal they're known for. Lyrically, the group's debut LP, Ignorance, catches them at a crossroad of sorts. Although the lyrics may not do a great job of establishing the band's identity, one thing this album does say about Sacred Reich is that they're fantastic. For proof, look no further; Ignorance kicks total ass.
While the politically charged lyrical themes explored on certain tracks hint at the band's more accessible later works, the music sure doesn't. If you've only heard The American Way or Independent, forget most of what you think you know about Sacred Reich, because the songs here, save for mellow instrumental Layed to Rest, are by far Sacred Reich's most brutal tracks, which are more of the raw and aggressive Slayer/Dark Angel ilk as opposed to the songs on their other album commonly cited as their magnum opus, The American Way, which are more geared towards the Metallica/Testament school of mid-paced thrash. Ignorance does
not let up for half-ballads or rap/funk excursions. It brings the riffs and leaves you worn out like an old fashioned thrash album should.
A very intense and fun highlight of Ignorance (Certainly one of the album's best, if not
the best) is the insane opening track "Death Squad". You want a thrash metal tune that'll riff your goddamn face off? Set your watch to riff o'clock and crank up this devastating four and a half minute burst of concentrated aural intensity. Phil Rind's relentless and enraged shouting, far removed from the Hetfield-inspired gruff singing approach he'd pick up soon after, back up a raging storm of fast drumbeats and chaotic riffage. The track concludes with one final reprising of its magnificent chorus. "Taken by force, controlled by fear, DEATH SQUAD POLICE OF THE RIGHT!" I don't know who made the decision to have "Death Squad" as the opening track, but they clearly knew what they were doing, as this song leaves a good impression of what to expect from here on out. In fact, this track can quite easily be broken down bit by bit to demonstrate elements that are consistent throughout the album.
As soon as the album begins, the amazing introductory riff of "Death Squad" should send any metalhead into a fit of concentrated, intense headbanging. Right away, it's demonstrated that there are some magnificent slower, heavy riffs on this album. The opening to this song includes just one of many. Check out the opening riffage of "No Believers", the amazing head crushing riff at about 2:21 in "Violent Solutions", or that super badass one at about 1:50 in "Rest in Peace".
As "Death Squad" picks up speed following a superb intro, one can begin to get a feel for the album's more traditionally "thrashy" moments. There are a lot of lightning fast riffs here, and fortunately, Sacred Reich are very good at bringing the speed. Just about every "fast part" is guaranteed to inspire air guitaring or headbanging for any dedicated thrasher. The greatest rapid-fire mania on this album is contained within "No Believers", which is the fastest of them all, and "Administrative Decisions", where the incredibly fast riffs aren't the least bit hampered by their bursting following a minute long, much slower intro.
As if "Death Squad" wasn't impressive enough for any thrasher by 2:41 in, they just
had to throw in an orgasmic thrash break with an uber aggressive riff. This serves as just a taste of one of Ignorance's biggest strengths. Trust me when I say you're going to be seeing a lot more of these moments, and they kick tons of ass each and every time. Thrash breaks, mosh sections, breakdowns (No, not those lame metalcore breakdowns), whatever you want to call em, Ignorance has one just about every song that's sure to have inspired many a frenzied mosh pit back in '87. Sacred Reich's proficiency at crafting an excellent thrash breakdown on this album simply cannot be understated, as it is critical to what makes this album a good listen. Even the otherwise weak title track boasts a very impressive tempo change towards the end. Perhaps the best of these moments on the whole album comes halfway through the ripping finale "Administrative Decisions", at which point the band pretty much commands the listener to start headbanging or jumping or slam dancing or
something to react to the jaw-dropping intensity of the metal mayhem before them.
The one big flaw that seems to remain consistent throughout the record is the lead guitar work, which leaves plenty to be desired. While the riffs are--for the most part--completely ***ing awesome, many of the guitar solos mostly feel like uninspired shredding, and are rarely memorable. It often feels like a solo was thrown in just for the sake of one being there. This isn't really a big deal, except on "Layed to Rest", a short instrumental track consisting entirely of uninteresting wailing guitars layered atop acoustic guitar lines. That stuff was fine and all on Testament's sophomore effort The New Order, because Alex Skolnick is a master axeman. Wiley Arnett is not, and while it could have been a good intro to the title track if it were sliced in half and made no longer standalone, as it is "Layed to Rest" is long enough to drag down the flow of the album. Wiley Arnett and Jason Rainey bring the riffs, but bland solos would continue to be a problem throughout much of Sacred Reich's discography.
Although I mentioned earlier in the review that this album's lyrical subject matter varies between political/social songs and more fantasy oriented violent/scary themes, one thing this album is consistent in is its bleakness. Every song here is cynical and dark. "Death Squad" is a dark examination of American intervention, boasting a magnificent chorus which I just couldn't resist repeating the first half of earlier on in this review. The magnificently brutal "No Believers" is basically a big *** you to Christianity that would be mocked today, but was a no doubt big shock in the days of the Moral Majority. Slayer has really been overdoing the whole "*** your god" thing, but Sacred Reich did it once in '87 and left it alone, making it seem so much more effective and cool here. Its chorus (The only other one on the album that can compete with Death Squad's), featuring the lyrics "Get up off your knees, cause there's no god in heaven!" is delivered with just too much grit for me to make a crack about it being "euphoric" or whatever. "Sacred Reich" examines Hitler and the holocaust, and "Rest in Peace" seems to be about Freddy Krueger. Since Rind was pretty young, some lyrics are kind of juvenile ("Rotting corpse/Slowly rotting away" or "Innocent victims killed by death" are both noticeably contrived lines that come to mind), but it's all in good fun, and youthfulness isn't always bad; any pimply adolescent could relate to, say, "Administrative Decisions", Phil Rind's angry rant towards the American education system and those who doubted him.
The occasional obvious lyrical immaturity and mostly underwhelming lead work can't undermine a monument to raw, heavy thrash metal like Sacred Reich's monumental debut album, Ignorance. It isn't quite consistent enough to be considered a masterpiece--Layed to Rest is the only truly bad song here, but even otherwise fine songs like "Sacred Reich" or "Rest in Peace" just can't compete with "Death Squad" or "Administrative Decisions"--but like on all their albums, when Sacred Reich is good, they're really damn good. If none of the rest of Sacred Reich's discography is heavy enough for you, then stick with this monster. 4/5.
RECOMMENDED TRACKS/BEST OF:
Death Squad
No Believers
Administrative Decisions
