Swordmaster - Postmortem Tales (1997)^{Release ID: 12100}

This record from the early days of the retro thrash trend came onto most people’s radar, if at all, due to the fact that the band was led by Emil Nödtveidt, little brother of Dissection mastermind Jon Nödtveidt. While both bands play Swedish blackened death metal, they couldn’t be further apart in attitude and execution. This album is an exercise in balls-to-the-wall retro thrash, and the band evidently have a fantastic time playing it. This would swiftly become an overcrowded and unoriginal little subgenre, but Swordmaster, along with bands like Witchery and The Crown, who were exploring a looser and more raucous re-styling, were early adopters.

There is nothing original here, this should be clear from the outset. However, it’s enjoyable to listen to as it rattles along like a runaway train, drums clattering like a dropped bag of spanners, guitars desperately racing to keep up (mostly succeeding). A mixed bag of Teutonic thrash influences pervade the album, most prominently early Kreator (“Postmortem Tales”) and Destruction (“Black Ace”), with a Schmier-like snarl to the otherwise black metal-styled vocals and a dry, thin-as-paper Harris Johns production that still manages to sound heavy. The paint-peeling guitar leads smack of Nasty Savage and Slayer.

Some Swedish melodic death sounds do worm their way into the songs at times, like the harmony guitar lines behind the chorus of “Crush To Dust”, and some songs do slow down to more of a Celtic Frost plod in places (“Claws Of Death”, “The Serpent Season”), but I think the record as a whole is best summed up by a hilarious tongue-in-cheek moment in “Past Redemption”: a full speed thrash attack that breaks into a little Malmsteen-meets-Helloween neo-classical interlude mid-way through... then returning to the rifferama with a phlegm-gargling one-liner: “back to business!”

Good friendly violent fun.