Slaves of Evil - Madness of Silence

SLAVES OF EVIL - Madness of Silence (Self financed CD 2014)

And another new killer band from Poland… and you know what? They play death metal! What a surprise hahaha! But seriously now, Slaves of Evil is their name and yes, they are newcomers, but with no demo recordings they decided to open their discography already with a full length… which is always a risky decision, as often the bands rush too much and then release some crap, thinking they’ll become quickly another underground stars. Today it’s all so easy; you can get a good sound at home and for small money press a limited edition of professional CDs on your own. Hmm, and maybe I am old fashioned, but I still like the old way of doing things: first the demos, then maybe a single and finally a full length album. But of course there are always some good exceptions… and I think that Slaves of Evil is just one of them. Yes, with no demos and promo recordings they went straight to the full length material, but this is some seriously crushing piece of brutal death metal, which – with that production quality and musical level – would simply sound awkward on demo tape haha! So, I am not gonna moan at all and simply listen and recommend you “Madness of Silence”.

So, let’s play this relentless death metal slaughter! Slaves of Evil is a band, which can easily be described as rather typical brutal death metal machine, inspired mainly by the American bands such as Immolation, Suffocation, Morbid Angel, Hate Eternal, Malevolent Creation and such European acts like Sinister, Severe Torture, Vader… and add Krisiun to that list haha! “Madness of Silence” is nothing overwhelming or spectacular, it’s not an album, which will take Slaves of Evil to the altar with the best bands of the genre… No, they’re just followers, but followers, who know what they’re doing and know how to slay the listener with some guts ripping riffs, crushing drumming and great, furious vocals. The majority of this material speeds like crazy, there’s blast on blast, Slaves of Evil use slower part only as a short break and rest before another cannonade of blasting death metal erupts from the speakers. With such fast and technical material, it’s easy to end up being simply boring and unimpressive, but luckily “Madness of Silence” is enough filled with great ideas and arrangements to keep me interested for the whole time. There’s only one condition – it must be played loud, to really feel the strength and massive power of this music. And loud I play it all day now. It’s great also that all songs are equally solid and good, there’s not a single moment on this album, which would bore me and sound like a filler. And when the album is so even, it’s also difficult to pick up the favourite songs, but maybe such “Death Countenance”, “The War with God”, “Hell Dwellers”, “The Army of the Damned”, “Insignificant Truth” are the best. Surprisingly, some of them even have some catchy and memorable, but always brutal riffs! Oh, let me also mention that the performance of every band member is great. OK, maybe the bass is practically unhearable, but the guitars are great, I like the solos a lot… and the drummer is probably another octopus with six hands hahaha! Awesome stuff.

So, very good album, indeed. And let me just remind you that the band released it for their own money, but the quality of this CD is just superb. Very nice booklet, great creepy artwork, also the production is spotless… Self financed it is, but as good as from record label. Recommended for maniacs of brutal death metal!

Standout tracks: “Death Countenance”, “The War with God”, “Hell Dwellers”, “The Army of the Damned”

Final rate: 70/100