Лабиринт

MACTEP is a veteran band in Russian metal that is mostly known due to their
ties to Aria. Lead by bassist extraordinaire, Alik Granovsky, MACTEP are known for playing fast paced thrash and keeping the oldschool legions happy.

Personally, I never really cared for most of their post-Aria material. Then again, most underground thrash (hell, most thrash in general) bores me. I like to put on some Megadeth, Tetament or Annhiliator once in a while and still enjoy hearing some older Metallica or Pantera for that vicarious bandana wearing, "rock out with your cock out" feel. But, I diverge...

This album is a welcome change. The groove is quite infectious and most of the songs actually have their own identity. The guitar reminds me of other bands, but there is still some sort quality to it that I just can't place. Of course, the musicians that wield the guitars, are top notch.

The first three songs on "Labyrinth" are recommended to thrash fans since they are the most typically "thrashtastic" of the bunch. My personal favourite of those three is title track.

The fourth song, "Kresti" is a ballad. I think that MACTEP clearly surpass all the other Russian bands in the art of ballad creation. In fact, even though I don't care too much for the band, I consider their ballads to be some of the best in the metal scene. There is just an amazing earnestness to the song and the lyrics (provided my Margarita Pushkina of Aria fame) just send chills down my spine. Undeniably the best song on the album.

The rest of the album is pretty standard and unremarkable. A comical track called Metal Doctor that isn't too bad, some guitar and bass masturbation and a couple more tracks round off the album.

I must note that MACTEP recently (2000?) acquired a new vocalist Lexx, and he has quite a decent voice for a thrash vocalist. He's no Chuck Billy but he does his job well. The previous vocalist could probably reach higher notes, but then again, he sounds amazingly off key live.

So, I don't what kind of music fan one has to be to enjoy this album. An open minded Russian metal fan perhaps? Check out Aria instead, if you haven't done so yet. Poseur.

If, according to UltraBoris, "Talk of The Devil" to Master was like "Beneath The Remains" to Sepultura, "Maniac Party" like "Arise" and "Songs of The Dead" like "Chaos AD", then this is some fucking "Roots", no doubt. The awesome line-up is long gone, except the bassist founder Alik Granowskiy, they got this new lame guitarist and, even worse, this new vocalist. Yes, he sounds really bad. Especially compared to the amazing performace of Serishev in the early Master albums. But, oh well that can be applied to the whole line-up.
About the music. Well... what can be said? The guitar sound is awful, the riffs are incredibly worthless, recycled stuff. Plus, the annoying thing is the abrupt ending of some riff and the immediate starting of another musical passage. It has lots of fill-ins of some silly, long and unstructured bass/guitar and don't-know-what-else sounds, that are really much irritating. This sounds really un-professional, like they first took their instruments in their lives. The worst of the worst is the title track. Listen to it at approx. 00:45. Goddamn, this is not just a total Electric Funeral worship, this is a total rip-off. And it repeats again during the song.
All the album is all the same. I gave it 30 whole points. Well, not casually, still there's at least some music. You can even listen one song of the album without getting mad. Just terribly annoyed. The solos are sometimes nice, though. Besides all that, the final track "Who Beats Whom?(instrumental)" doesn't save the situation that much, really. One can go and listen to the original one with the whole butt-kicking first album.
The best track on here is "Visokosnyi Vek", but it doesn't make it a really good song.

Well, this can be pretty much thrown away. Not much more to say. Stick with early Master, for some great speed/thrash's sake.