Sadus - Elements of Anger (1997)^{Release ID: 2982}

This man, Sadus vocalist Darren Travis knows how to keep his patience. His bandmate Steve Di Giorgio is often busy with other metal bands, but when he finds the right time, he and Travis get to work on another album. Back then, the only other bands Di Giorgio was in were death metal legends Death and Autopsy. It wasn't until 1999 when he began being busier with dozens more bands. While he is one of the finest guitar/bass players in thrash metal, his time in Sadus is where he was at his most creative...

Sadus has expanded their contributing field quite a bit. They began bashing their way through supersonic thrash in their 1988 debut Illusions. Then they started spicing things up with their deathly technical thrash metal pair albums, Swallowed in Black and A Vision of Misery, both released in the early 90s. That was at a dark time when demands for new sounds overpowered many thrash bands active since the 80s. The band still managed to record the Red Demo in 1994 and later released a compilation, Chronicles of Chaos (probably named after one of the very first metal webzines). Then came Elements of Anger, featuring re-recordings from that demo!

Beginning track "Aggression" really takes its name seriously, pouring out all its anger towards the listener. That's how they do their modern-ish technical thrash! Everything's perfectly eventful, including performing hectic technical guitar at the same time as shouting vocal drama, ahead of Di Giorgio's burping bass. "Crutch" follows as a modern progressive thrash composition to fight in an arena. "Words of War" has wild technical thrash from their "retro" phase while making eclectic borders on death metal tempos.

"Safety in Numbers" plays the safe route as a sprawling ballad-ish track with long times of atmosphere, mid-paced with rough riffs creeping into quiet passages. "Mask" continues this not-so-speedy approach similar to the atmospheric groove/thrash of Grip Inc. "Fuel" (from the Red Demo) is short, but shreds in the faster second half.

"Power of One" is also from the demo, this one being mid-paced and leaning towards sinister doom. "Stronger Than Life" is a real banger of destruction with rapid guitar rage before the mid-break stomps through. "Unreality" also takes its name seriously with its surreal intro, then we jump into the mosh action of technical semi-thrash. "In the End" is the ending track of ballad-ish groove that people thought was the end of that band's saga...until their next album a decade later.

Yep, there was an almost decade-long period of silence for this band before their next album, though the silence after their most recent album is much longer and ongoing, despite a few concerts and hints of recording new material. It shouldn't be too long before a new album, right? Anyway, enjoy their last album before the new millennium!

Favorites: "Aggression", "Crutch", "Fuel", "Stronger Than Life", "Unreality"