Thrash metal that is unafraid of daring to do things a little outside of the Swedish metal mold. Slightly growling vocals that kill throats and remind one of near Slayer awesome. Fast and pounding drums anthem their way into your brain causing ecstasy and headbanging. These are some mean looking fucks too on their cover art. I highly doubt any one in Guillotine would be afraid to be the executioner and purveyor of the bloody guillotine. Let the heads roll I could hear them say. But also “Blood Money” isn’t a bunch of mindless blatthering about how tough the band is, how much gore they can shove into their lyrics, or how anti-society they are. Thankfully they attack the politics of the U.S. and the ridiculous amount of money that corporations and politicians push around to one another. Guillotine refuses to sit around amid this circle jerk of influence and peddling without raising their voice. And that voice is a welcome one.

Vocalist Sabina Classen isn’t just another hot metal singer; she’s a class act that not only lights up the stage but sets it ablaze with her stirring vocals and stunning presence. Thrash metal has seen a revitalization lately in the metal community but bands like Holy Moses who have been around for nearly three decades never stopped to jump onto the latest trend or bandwagon. Tons of cymbal catches, harsh power chords, and harsh aggressive female vocals. The rhythm guitar takes a lesson or two from Kerry King (Slayer) and the abuse of the metal strings is daunting. A fitting title for an album that will kick you in the ass.

Thrash metal is to heavy metal as viagra is to spam. Kreator is at the center of it all, and noting their age, they may even need some viagra to get it on with middle aged groupies. But all that said, Kreator is and was one of the most important fissures in the thrash metal genre. This March they re-released on DVD their “Live in East Berlin” and “Hallucinative Comas”, both of which were previously only available on the analog VHS format. It’s nice to see that bands care enough about their fans to give them a hold-over while they patiently wait for the band to release its next album sometime early in 2009. The DVD features some never-before-seen interviews and the concert is re-mixed into glorious 5.1 sound quality. Now that’s shredtastic!

The new album by F5 (yeah the key in between your F4 and F6 on your PC keyboard dweeb) is called “The Reckoning” and the trashy trailer park nomenclature doesn’t end there. For those of us that deem ourselves old school metal heads, it was like a stab in the heart when bassist David Ellefson and drummer Jimmy DeGrasso (formerly of Megadeth and Suicidal Tendencies) joined together to be a nu-metal nuisance. But wounds heal and “The Reckoning” actually delivers a bone-crushing thrash album that is worthy of mention amid a paragraph that namedrops Megadeth and Suicidal Tendencies.