Album Review: Kreator - "Phantom Antichrist"

Thrash Metal has to be my favorite genre of music, hands down. Loving everything from Municipal Waste, to Slayer, to S.O.D., to Warbringer, Thrash has been my number one genre for as long as I can remember. One of my favorite Thrash bands for a while have been German titans Kreator. Just today they dropped their newest full-length album upon the world...

...and I'm not a huge fan of it.

Kreator have been a hugely influential band in the Thrash Metal genre. They were a part of the "Teutonic Thrash" movement, consisting of three Germanic bands -- Destruction, Sodom, and Kreator. Kreator blew up the scene with their 1986 release Pleasure to Kill, and even though they had their ups and downs afterwards, they've always kept pushing forward. Kreator's previous two releases, Enemy of God (2005) and Hordes of Chaos (2009) went for a well polished, more melodic angle, filling their songs with catchy hooks and harmonized riffs. As an avid fan of Melodic Death Metal, I thought those last two albums were pretty solid efforts.

Phantom Antichrist on the other hand, seems to show Kreator continuing with the Melo-Death theme but loosing steam with it. The riffage is getting a little uninspired and is beginning to sound recycled. There are some sweet guitar bits on the album though. The title track shows some pretty wicked fretwork from guitarists Mille and Sami. One thing that has been consistent since their last couple albums has been Mille's vocals. He still sounds as pissed off as before, spitting out hate-fueled line after hate-fueled line.

If that's not the most forced "I'm evil" pose ever, I don't know what is. It's okay Mille, we still love you.

Bomb-Ass Tracks

Phantom Antichrist: The title track rips pretty fucking hard. It was released before the album came out and got me really excited for this LP. No matter how disappointed I am with the record, this song still rules.

From Flood into Fire: This sounds like it could have been a track off of a Manowar album. The chorus is one of those headbang-your-fucking-neck-off-and-chant-along choruses.

I normally include three songs here, but I really only found these two songs to be that notable on the album.

Overall Score

6/10

Kreator seem to be running dry of their Melodic Thrash Metal inspiration. It's still decent Metal, but its nowhere near Kreator good. I'm sure a few songs off of Phantom Antichrist will probably play on my iPod every once in a while, and I'll be eagerly waiting for their next album.

That's all for now, folks. Keep being Awesome.