Review by Ben for Artillery - Terror Squad (1987)

Artillery were another band that I had never heard until I noticed how well it rated on RYM. Considering some of the reviews below labelled them Denmark's response to Metallica, I was keen to check it out. The first thing I needed to get past though is the horrendous cover, which I can partly excuse them for because the record label apparently lost the original artwork. The second thing I needed to get past is the vocals which are quite distracting. It's not that they are terrible, because most of the time they're quite decent. But when he starts shrieking, which he does often, it's all just a bit embarrassing really.

Which is a shame, cause the riffs on Terror Squad are great. The drumming is more than adequate, the guitar sound is rather chunky, and these guys are going all out to create an extremely heavy piece of thrash metal. If it wasn't for the vocalist stealing the show throughout, I'd enjoy this much more than I do. As it is, I can only see this album as a promising release that makes me want to check out their other stuff in hope of finding a true gem. Highlights include Terror Squad and At War with Science.