Review by Rexorcist for Deathrow - Life Beyond (1992)

Seeing the RYM ratings between Deathrow's iconic Deception Ignored and their follow-up, Life Beyond, drop from 3.7 to 3.4, the latter of which is the same rating as their divisive debut, I was a little worried that the album would miss out on the key factors that made them such an icon in the thrash world in the first place.  But I started to doubt those very doubts upon finishing that opening title track.  If it proves anything, it's that Deathrow had not lost their sense of fun, or their ability to be technical.  Of course, it should be said that this is a somewhat less technical album than Deception Ignored, and that's probably the reason it gets so much slack.  But if they wanna have more fun and try to write a bunch of different types of songs again, then let them, because I was having a good deal of fun myself.  This might not be a TECHNICAL album, but it sure is wild.  The thing is, these tracks might share SOME similarities overtime, but they're really too different from each other to call it a monotonous album.  Staying in the tech thrash constraints, it maximizes what the genre's capable of like South of Heaven did, even if the combination of rhythms, production and vocals doesn't meet that same greatness.  Some tracks are edgy and a little groovy, some are wild and just plain fun, some are angry and even kinda evil, etc.  Deathrow proves themselves to be artists three times in a row as far as I'm concerned.

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