Cavalera Conspiracy: Blunt Force Trauma

The Brazilian brotherly love-in continues.

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With a reunion of the classic Sepultura line-up still tantalisingly out of reach, the second album from reconciled siblings Max and Igor Cavalera is about as close as you’ll get.

Ironically, given that it’s part of an ongoing healing process, the whole thing is as abrasive as a rub-down with a cheese grater.

Here, Max parks the spiritual leanings and world-music tourism of Soulfly to ramp up both the 80s metal (Thrasher is as retro as its title suggests) and old school hardcore influences (the latter rubber-stamped by the presence of Agnostic Front bruiser Roger Miret on the bloody-knuckled Lynch Mob).

What little fat there was on 2008’s Inflikted debut has been blasted away here, with several songs bolting for the finishing line at under three minutes. No Chaos AD, but a fine surrogate.

Dave Everley

Dave Everley has been writing about and occasionally humming along to music since the early 90s. During that time, he has been Deputy Editor on Kerrang! and Classic Rock, Associate Editor on Q magazine and staff writer/tea boy on Raw, not necessarily in that order. He has written for Metal Hammer, Louder, Prog, the Observer, Select, Mojo, the Evening Standard and the totally legendary Ultrakill. He is still waiting for Billy Gibbons to send him a bottle of hot sauce he was promised several years ago.