Usurper

Unabashedly metal and proud of it, Usurper once again wave the flag of no bullshit ‘80s metal mixed with modern heaviness with Twilight Dominion, their first for Earache. It's hard not to enjoy this stuff, what with the lyrics about liking metal and that over-the-top metal cover art. There's even lots of Tom G. Warrior-influenced death grunts, although not as many as on previous Usurper platters. The riffs hearken back to the heyday of underground thrash, but the overall effect is not by any means a Swedish retro kind of thing, more of a sludgy death vibe, not unlike Celtic Frost at their most rockin'. The drumming is a bit simple and the production (namely the limp drum sound) kind of sucks the life out of the songs at points, but again, it's pretty hard to not enjoy Usurper. Is it worth your hard earned cash? Well, it's long, so you get lots of fist-banging, uh, bang for your buck; if you wonder what the mighty Frost would sound like now (if they had a clue), Twilight Dominion will keep the air guitars plugged in until the wee hours.