This is the second album from the Bay Area thrash pioneers, and the first with vocalist Steve “Zetro” Souza – original singer (the crazy Paul Baloff) walked out whilst writing was in progress for this album, but he gets writing credits for his contribution. For those who do not know the history of the band, Exodus were arguably the first thrash band of the period, and Kirk Hammet was a founding member before joining Metallica. Whereas Metallica slowed down their approach which gave them a wider appeal, Exodus stuck to their guns and stayed true to the thrash. The first four albums are classics of the genre. Bonded By Blood gets all the attention, but the next three are all good albums.
Deranged, the opening track, has a deranged-criminal-creepy-spoken word intro, before thrashing your brain accordingly. It’s all pretty much standard Bay Area thrash apart from Brain Dead, which has a killer chugga riff, and steps slightly sidewise off the path and makes it more interesting. The title track, which is the best track on the album, and again sees the band trying different things. The other stand out track is Chemi-Kill, which has a nice intro and a killer riff.
I know most old school thrash aficionados will probably own this and rightly so.
8/10 from The Grooveman.
