Necronomicon

Necronomicon is one of those German thrash bands that never got the attention they actually deserved. They always walked through the shadows of the three main bands of the German scene which are Kreator, Destruction, and Sodom. The main reason for that is because Necronomicon has always been compared to Destruction, and I may admit that the comparisons are very legitimate. Yes, both bands in their early years sounded very similar to each others, and in nearly every way, which can make people think that Necronomicon was just a copy and that they released nothing original compared to them. The first record of Destruction was way back in 1984, and then here in 1986, we saw the release of the self-titled album Necronomicon, which was their first official album, two years later. In fact, this is what caused Necronomicon to have less attention than their country mates. However, this doesn't remove the fact that awesome music came out of these guys, being influenced by the mates of Destruction, how could they go wrong anyway..?

Well, this is the only problem with "Necronomicon", it just came out too late, and other bands released something similar before them. Despite those details, let's get our fact straight, this album is a fucking piece of violent and brutal German thrash, it has all what an adept of 80s European thrash want in an album, in my opinion. "Necronomicon" has a running time of 37 minutes featuring 8 songs. There are quite a bit of variety out there though, such as "Insanity" which is a song of barely 3 minutes, with a drum solo/intro of 1 minute in it. But we also have songs like "Dark Land", the longest track with a length of nearly 7 minutes, showing off what the band is capable of musically. The first thing that catch our attention when listening the album is the unique sound quality, I am not speaking quality-wise but rather in rawness, because the album has a somewhat "punkish" sound on it, which is a pretty damn cool thing. The songwriting on the album is great, they had a lot of great ideas for sure, but like I said before, they were inspired by what Destruction did earlier, especially on their first album "Infernal Overkill" in 1985, a year before. They basically continued in their own way, what Destruction has stopped doing in 1986.

The musicianship on the album is far from top-notch, but it's still great enough to enjoy everything that is played, especially for a first effort. The mix on the album is pretty much what you would expect from a record with that production work. I would say that the main focus on the album is the guitars, because they are somewhat higher in the mix than the other instruments. but in general, the mix is pretty good, despite having some difficulties hearing the bass in some tracks. The drums are well-performed, using basic thrash technic. The vocals of Freddy are basically a worship of Schmier, they have a really similar tone (which is a good thing for Destruction's fans), and you can also notice some harsh screams, which proves even more my point. Another interesting thing on the album is the kind of riffs we have. Yes, the type of riffs are similar to those of Destruction, but Necronomicon made great additions to it, by expanding even more what they did before. You will also hear the typical fancy guitar solos like in Destruction. The most popular song is indeed "Possessed by Evil", which is a unique original piece of the German thrash scene and is mainly considered a classic. The song was eventually picked-up to feature on a compilation album a year later.

The lyrical content of the album has never been released or revealed by the band, but it's pretty easy to tell that the subjects are generally the same as the other German bands of that time. Those subjects include the occult, evil, and satanic stuff. I noticed that when hearing passages like this one in "Hades Invasion", "This is Satan sacrifice, Lucifer takes your souls away". I think it made out clear about what they're singing about. Overall, this is not the catchiest album ever, but songs like "Blind Destruction" or "Iron Charm" has solid choruses, this is the kind of songs that got stuck in my head for a bit of time. In an overview, there's no bad tracks on this album at all, each track have their great moments and killer riffs.

Finally, I obviously recommend people to give the album a few listens. This is the kind of album that needs to grow in you before appreciating its evil art, but once you're into it, you will dig it and see its catchiness. If you're a 80s German thrash metal fan, especially Destruction, then you need to look up to it. I give a high rating for this record compared to other reviewers because in my book, this is an undeniable classic German thrash album.

Highlights :

Dark Land
Iron Charm
Magic Forest
Possessed by Evil

In terms of the here presented band, the German metal press of the mid-eighties did not state its opinion explicitly. This was not even necessary. Everybody could read between the lines a certain degree of contempt. Necronomicon were seen as the incompetent brothers of Destruction. This was fairly understandable, because it was right that Schmier and his friends had the better riffs (and the more clever promotion). Additionally, the basic musical orientation of Necronomicon was well comparable with that of Destruction and both bands originated from the same region of Germany. Anyway, Necronomicon were no clones of Destruction. They shared the same passion for thrash metal, but they did not copy the approach of albums such as "Infernal Overkill". Necronomicon tried to go its own ways, although some high-pitched screams of the lead vocalist were very close to that of Schmier.

The band did not lack of enthusiasm. Almost 30 years after its publication, the self-titled debut still sounds vivid and temperamental. It goes without saying that the riffs are the key success factor. The good news is that most of them possess the necessary degree of sharpness and momentum. But the bad news is that convincing riffs alone do not form automatically good songs. The guitar work on "Necronomicon" too often fails to create a successful flow of the respective song. It is by no means garantueed that the listener is protected against unpleasant surprises. Some songs start with strong riffs, but their single parts do not truly fit together. This alone is not the death sentence for the songs. Nevertheless, this problem occurs frequently. At this stage of their career, mature song-writing did unfortunately not belong to the core competencies of the band members. This may be the main reason why this album fell on deaf ears. Not to mention the integration of a few inappropriate elements such as the punk-like background vocals of "Iron Charm". They kill the underlying riff in a matter of seconds. Contrariwise, the relatively complex opener "Dark Land" avoids successfully any serious mistakes and the result was absolutely worth listening.

The solos are the playground for the guitarists to show their technical skills, but they do not add value to the songs. As a consequence, they are missing the point. More or less the same applies for the songs themselves. Necronomicon wanted to impress the listener with varied and diverse compositions, but the band members overexerted themselves. Instead of creating some fairly catchy tracks, the courageous dudes wanted to show the whole bandwidth of their musicianship. The result is acceptable, but less would have been more.

Had Necronomicon's s/t debut been released just a few years before, and had a more consistent quality to it, it might have been this band that we were hailing as one of the 'Big Three' of thrash metal, in place of...Destruction. I only say this because the album sounds quite a lot like Schmier and company, only far more sloppy, as if it were released before the proper amount of gestation could transpire. But the riffing methods sound very similar, the level of musical ability once they get fired up, and of course the vocals of Volker Fredrich, which sound like Schmier if he had his throat clogged with a particularly nasty head cold. In fact, Volker might even sound a little more bloodied and aggressive, but clunky and not nearly so distinct.

The biggest issue with Necronomicon in its original release was the decision to open with "Dark Land", which is almost 7 minutes of choppy, mostly instrumental thrash (there are a few vocal lines in the middle) which is a roller coaster of good and bad ideas. Often, the bass will feel out of key, for example, though I recognize they were trying to create a subversive effect with it. There are also a lot of stop/start riffs which feel in desperate need of streamlining with properly written transitions, and ultimately it's a seething mess. "Possessed by Evil" and "Bloody Revenge" are improvements, with more cohesive composition, a pastiche of Destruction, Sodom and Running Wild style riffs, but neither is quite enduring, nor is the speed/rush of "Insanity" with its lengthy drum intro. You have to pluck much deeper into the album to find the better material, like the noodling bombast of "Blind Destruction", spiked walls of "Hades Invasion" or the carnal blaze of "Magic Forest", but none of these are exemplary and the riffs don't leave a lasting impression.

I hate to keep drawing the same comparison, and I'm sure the band has heard it a thousand times and hates it, but this really comes off as the poor man's Destruction (or Sodom, if we're thinking of just In the Sign of Evil and Obsessed by Cruelty). None of the songs really have that distinct quality that transforms them into legend, and the lyrical topics and guitar tones all sound as if they'd been committed to the annals of thrashistory already by the previous year. The album doesn't expand upon or even offer a worthwhile, sidereal journey to any of the ripping released that had already spawned, and it feels like more of the same, a step backward and down off the podium. Granted, it's not terrible, and it has a rugged charm to it you won't find around modern thrash metal releases today, but it's far too easily forgotten in the face of even this band's later catalog (yes, they will improve on the subsequent albums).

-autothrall
http://www.fromthedustreturned.com

“...he’s possessed by evil and his master sitting on a throne of blood…”

Germany is remembered and renown for many things – WW1 & 2, clocks, cars, wacky porno, one of three or four languages you had to trudge through in high school, and a group of bands that are still the Teutonic Trio. What's even more striking is that each of the three have their own distinct sound, style and musical traits. Necronomicon isn’t one of the three, their timing off by a few years. This is a good thing. The trio only needs one Destruction.

Oddly enough, the back cover photo of the quartet screams a 'lil punk rock with three of the four members donning the familiar short, spiked hairdo of that overrated genre, but c’mon, with a name like Necronomicon? Possessed by Evil? Screw it. You buy the damn disc and jam it onto the turntable, hoping your gut instincts haven’t steered you into a piss-poor collision of Ramones meets Sex Pistols or something even worse. I was one of the lucky ones, having been exposed to the title cut via some compilation (Metalwork's '87 Fast Forward to Hell, actually) and the album itself through a decent review in Denmark's Blackthorn Magazine left my instincts free to sweat over other shaky-looking stuff like Impaler and Cirith Ungol (?!). The title cut was all I needed to locate some back alley record store somewhere in NJ blasting something akin to watered down Artillery when I walked in the door - there it was...the record on the shelf...I drool on my eleven bucks (hey, it was an import)...it’s mine...show mom my new toy...she cringes at two or three song titles...and we jump in the car where I try to ram the lp into the tapedeck.

Somersaulting to the turntable at home, opening track “Dark Land” spins. After thinking this was a somewhat tedious instrumental, the vocals kick in after about a minute with a harsh Schmier-like snarl complete with requisite clean lofty notes he hits now and then. While frantic and heavy, the track meanders kinda aimlessly until the last ten seconds, but here comes the mighty title cut. Unless critically revamped, this is killer. Slow and dramatic is the start until all music shuts down so lungmeister Volker Fredrich can bellow the title in a “Bestial Invasion”-like design, yet with a more monstrous, roaring and un-Schmier-like pitch. The song peaks with a fist-clenching, triumphant chorus and another ferocious yell or two to conclude the barrage.

“Bloody Revenge” is a mostly mid-tempo jogger until speed breaks over the basic riff's single tide and vocal arrangement at the end. Percussion slowly builds the intro to “Insanity”,. where a riff very similar to Hirax’s “Call of the Gods” creates an air of wild victory while Volker rumbles accordingly, especially during the short stint where the guitars vanish and just he and drummer Axel Strickstrock go for the gold, providing a fine ending to side one.

“Blind Destruction” is much like “Dark Land”, a person holding a place in line for someone else more or less, meanwhile “Hades Invasion” isn’t much more inventive than the previous two mentioned songs other than a brief breaking interlude and a middle section that sounds as though it’s going to implode, but instead segways into the same uninteresting speedy part. “Magic Forest”, with its strange start of spoken (snarled, actually) word supported with backing vocals, glints with promise and is probably tied for a spot on side two's highlight reel with a swerving chorus and constant haste. “Iron Charm” gives it a run for its money with speed alterations in the chorus and the mid-riff, an oddly gimpy solo, and backing vocal harmonies that quasi-dynamically announce the album’s end. Though considered the bright lights of side two, they kinda pale in comparison to “Insanity” and “Possessed by Evil”.

About fifteen minutes later I throw on Destruction’s Infernal Overkill, and the trio’s songwriting and musical superiority over Necronomicon is amplified to a point where I'll never ever confuse the two, and despite the more distorted guitar tone and snarl-fest vocals growling lower than Schmier’s, Necronomicon do sonically resemble their countrymen, but of course never reached their loftier heights of more intricate thrashdom. The solos have no real feeling and aren't well-regarded by the production, but that's a problem of all the guitars. In any case, I’ve grown less fond of this lp over the years, even more so than the original disappointment I felt, but that doesn’t mean I don’t toss it on once an eclipse or so.

Recommendable? German thrash enthusiasts definitely won’t find it useless, but the wider audience will probably find their minds wandering when the title cut or “Insanity” isn’t spinning. If you can get it cheap or with bonus tracks or a free hat, by all means.