Fear chords and the whinnying of a scared horse preface the arrival of the apocalypse, at least the way it’s portrayed on ‘Assassins of the Pentagram’. A deluge of intermeshing guitar noise assails the ears from the outset and there’s no respite from beginning to end.
And so the follow-up to 2012’s ‘Blitzkrieg Battalion’ is a frenetic, thrashy barrage of noise, dark, frenzied and brutal. The vocals rise from a deep-throated bark to a terrifying gothic scream above the full-throttle assault.
‘Assassins of the Pentagram’ risks - and at times, fails to steer clear of - falling to cliché, while the banshee howl becomes as much an annoyance as it is a signature. Harsh and abrasive, but a little hard to take seriously.
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