Album review: Bonded – Into Blackness

Thrash metal’s Big Four might all have hailed from the U.S., but Germany had its own hugely influential quartet in Sodom, Kreator, Destruction and beered-up party crashers Tankard. Bonded were formed by Sodom veterans Bernd ‘Bernemann’ Kost (guitars) and Markus ‘Makka’ Freiwald (drums). They weren’t there from the very beginning but have decades of Sodom service between them and the pedigree shines through on their new outfit’s second album.

Into Blackness does everything you might want from a modern thrash album. There are slow-building intros that you just know are going to explode into vicious shrapnel shards, and invariably do. There are gruff-yet-discernible vocals, high-speed serrated riffs and weighty mid-paced chugs. There are some moments when they deviate from the pure thrash playbook as well: Into The Blackness Of A Wartime Night brings in some Maiden-esque guitar leads, while Destroy The Things I Love relies more on atmospheric melody, and Final Stand exhibits more of an extreme death metal aggression.

Lyrically they veer from the grim reality of Watch (While The World Burns) – ‘Seems there's no limit in stupidity/ A tinfoil-headed Covidiocracy’ - to a four-song album centrepiece that crawls with Nazi vampires. It’s a blood-spattered mini-concept suite based on Richard Rhys Jones’ novel The Division Of The Damned, and is equal parts epic and gnarly. Everything is delivered with a savage precision and the production fizzes and crackles. There might not be many surprises or real innovation on show here, but if well-crafted, razor-sharp thrash metal floats your boat, you should give Into Blackness a try.

Verdict: 3/5

For fans of: Testament, Exodus, Sodom

Into Blackness is released on November 12 via Century Media