ARMAGEDON - Invisible Circle / Dead Condemnation (THRASHING MADNESS CD 2014)
This is one of those reissues I
was waiting to come for with a great hunger. All in all back in the early / mid
90’s Armagedon’s “Invisible Circle” belonged to my favourite death metal albums
(SERIOUSLY!). I was still a kid, but already knew the best death and thrash
metal classics… and I remember first time hearing about this band when I’ve
read interview with them in Metal Hammer, supporting this (then upcoming)
album… It was announced as second to Vader brilliant death metal band from
Poland. And soon later I found that cassette in local record store and
purchased it without hesitate, spending my all pocket money I had. And it
seriously turned into a real beast; amazing album, which accompanied me for
many years. But my old cassette is long dead, so I was waiting for a real
re-issue! Sure, I also had that miserable CDR release from Apocalypse
Productions, which was fine to have, but was not even half what I would expect!
And finally in 2014 Thrashing Madness managed to properly exhume “Invisible
Circle” and released this CD along with the awesome, classic “Dead
Condemnation” demo. And this is the first time these recordings have such
proper, quality release, so even if you still have your old tapes you may also
consider buying this CD, as the booklet and music are all fantastic. OK, the booklet
could have been better – read: maybe it could have some more information on the
old days of Armagedon, some more extras like and look like it’s on the
Merciless Death re-issues. Anyway, it’s not bad either: there are quite few
archival band photos plus all the lyrics from the album (sadly, no lyrics from
the demo)… Sure, those who like to moan will always find a reason to complain;
I will keep myself quiet, as the most important is that these materials are
finally available again and first time on CD (now, will there be also a vinyl
version or not??).
Of course it is not easy to
review an album, where you already know every sound perfectly… every song,
every riff, drum bit, all vocals are there in the head, so there’s no surprise
anymore and all became predictable. And where I listen to “Invisible Circle”
today I just know it to perfection. Obviously the same I can say about many
other classic records, such as “Altars of Madness”, “Testimony of the Ancients”
or “Left Hand Path” – I know them perfectly also, but they’re a class higher
than “Invisible Circle”, so they’ll never feel boring or monotonous and will
always deliver the highest dose of energy one can get from music. In case of
this debut CD of Armagedon I feel maybe slightly bored, but not because I don’t
like this album, but just because – as I mentioned before – I just know it too
well nowadays. So, it is just impossible for me to review it objectively,
especially as I hold all those memories from the old days… but giving a honest
review I can say that one thing is most important here and it is the fact that
“Invisible Circle” survived the test of time perfectly and it didn’t grow old
badly. It is still very vital material and it still sounds brilliantly
aggressive, powerful and not archaic at all! This is how you recognize timeless
classics!
I suppose that when I listen
to “Invisible Circle” today two things come to my mind first. One is that I
forgot how fast this music was, I suppose that Armagedon might have been one of
the fastest death metal bands of the time in the country! Most of the songs
have fast pace and sure, they’re not Krisiun fast and luckily they’re also not
Krisiun-boring fast, but have plenty of variety, also with slower parts and
many awesome arrangements… but I just forgot how many blasts are here and at
the same time how brilliant were Armagedon’s ideas, song structures and arrangements.
Secondly, the production… Hmm, I must say that this album sounded very good for
the Polish standards of early 90’s. Sure, nowadays some may say that the
guitars sound is slightly thin and surely would do better if it had more
“juice” or “meat” – read: was heavier, more powerful. Also the drums could be
better, but I suppose there’s no point in judging the production values from 20
years ago, as would it change anything? No, it would not.
Armagedon was rightfully
considered to be the best after Vader Polish death metal band… and “Invisible
Circle” will show you exactly why. Great musicianship, awesome ideas and
arrangements with plenty of variety and absolute lack of stagnation and
boredom, many absolutely fantastic songs – this is what you can find on the
album. Armagedon was sort of a mixture of Polish death metal aggression alike
to Vader, Betrayer and the classic American style of death metal. There are
particular riffs / ideas / songs which do remind me such classic bands as
Obituary, Malevolent Creation, Gorguts, Resurrection, Disincarnate, Cancer,
Monstrosity, etc and that is a compliment, but at the same time it is just
different! I can assure you that Armagedon didn’t have to be ashamed of
themselves when confronting their music with all these more popular foreign
representatives of death metal. Quality wise they were not so far behind them
(and in some cases they were even better, in my opinion!).
It’s almost impossible to
describe the whole content of “Invisible Circle” to those, who have never heard
this album before. Why? Because so much is going on within this album. Yes, it
is fairly traditional death metal, but Armagedon managed to compose several
killer songs and incorporated so many different ideas that I would have to go
track by track to describe it fully. The main scheme is what I described above:
aggressive death metal in the Polish / US vein. There are fast, uncompromising
songs such as “Death Liberates” and “In the Land of Uncertainty”, which both
are a truly blasting opening and there’s also such “Two Faces” – aarrrgghhhh! But
there are also such songs as “Circle of False Truths” (killer!!!!!), then “Instead
of Epilogue”, which is almost epic in few moments and surely has some of the
slower pieces off the whole album. Finally there’s the awesome “From Beyond
Oneself”, where the keyboards sound damn good and provide a fantastic, dark,
monumental atmosphere. For the entire duration the music is truly asskicking
and I cannot find any fillers here, all songs are superb. And as I already
mentioned, they didn’t get old at all, they still sound fresh! Sure, I wonder
how would some of these tunes sound with current recording studio conditions,
if were recorded in such Hertz Studio for instance… but I do hope that
Armagedon will never want to find that out and will never re-record any of
these old songs hehe!
Before “Invisible Circle”
there was also “Dead Condemnation” demo. And trust me, this is surely one of my
personal favourite demos ever! I love it. The production is just excellent, so
aggressive, harsh but powerful… and the songs are perfect with “The Term of
Existence” (which probably is even my most liked song in the whole Armagedon
career) and “Inside the Soul” (what a fast bastard!!!!!!) being my favourites! The
band already presented skills (both technical and compositional), which raised
them well above 99% of the rest of Polish metal scene and had amazing quality
of the recording and excellent material, better than most of the bands of the
time. I suppose there’s only one song on the demo, which I don’t like so much
and it is the last one called “Fate”, which has more thrash metal parts here
and there and definitely lacks that spark and violence of the rest of the material.
But who cares…
So, this is the whole “Invisible
Circle / Dead Condemnation”. Yes, very very sought after release and I am so
glad that it is finally out. So, get your copy now, even if you still have the
old cassettes you just need the CD as well, trust me!
Standout tracks: “Death
Liberates”, “Circle of False Truths”, “Two Faces”, “Instead of Epilogue”, “The
Term of Existence”
Final rate: 89/100
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