With names like Tyrannizer, Avenger, Vomitor and Skullsplitter on the books, it was always a safe bet that Nocturnal weren’t a bluegrass outfit. Blasting out a brutal barrage in the vein of the classic Teutonic triumvirate of Sodom, Kreator and Destruction, Nocturnal are part of a burgeoning underground exhuming the corpse of 80s thrash and gleefully skullfucking it.
This, their third full-length album, follows its predecessors – 2004’s Arrival Of The Carnivore and 2009’s Violent Revenge – in dishing up 10 tracks of thrashing, bashing and crashing, lots of screaming about death, darkness and demons, all accompanied by a great deal of gurning, grimacing and general grimness.
It’s as entertaining as it is interchangeable and it hardly matters what the songs are called or what order they’re in. We could change the album title to Infernal Aggression or Toxic Genocide and it’d all still work just fine. The retro thrash thing is arguably getting a bit old, but unless you’ve got enough of it to last you the rest of your life, you could do worse than check this out.
