Abracadaver (1991)

Tracklist:

1. SCG Minus 2: Horricone
2. Devilium
3. Abracadaver
4. Rejected
5. Acid Bleeding Eyes
6. Raging at Tomorrow
7. Beast of Both Worlds
8. I’m Sorry I’m Not Sorry
9. Bent Outta Shape
10. Evil
11. Vulture of Fire
12. Beastwood

The title is program – magic and decay with irony and word play as is Lordi well known for. It is opened by the typical intro, not really a song, called “SCG Minus 2: Horricone”. Themed like a intro to an italo-western movie of the 70s…. dusty and a whistling tune. Seems like some bands go like this at current times.

After the that all hell starts breaking loose and Lordi drives us thru a set of uptempo songs. It hits you like a hammer when the first notes ‘Devilium’ are powered thru your speakers. Full throttle, pedal to the medal with a slower refrain. Which goes neatly over into the title track ‘Abracadaver’. The voice is a perfect fit to the powerful metal songs – mostly growling dark throughout the songs with high pitches, singalong choruses and elements that can be traced back to the bands that were popular in the early nineties like Metallica, Anthrax, Crumbsuckers and a lot of others.

Thrashy heavy metal at it’s best. Each song is powerfully driving it’s rhythm, mixing all styles elements of the genre. Speed driven in permanent change with slower but always really heavy parts. ‘Rejected’ will be great for live sets as it is predestined to have some interactive potential for the audience singing the chorus. ‘Eyes bleeding acid’ – my personal favourite of this album – heavy driving, never loosing its pressure. And yes, I start repeating myself – every song is awesome heavy rock/metal. Great guitar work, heavy riffs with loads of bass. Burner.

‘Raging at tomorrow’ is the first song when Lordi grants a little time to catch your breath again. Slower, reminding you of Judas Priest or other metal classics, taking the foot from the throttle only a little bit. Only for a few moments until the steamroller starts to hit you again: ‘Beast of both worlds’. It all goes on and never stops – there is no dropout song on this album. Every song is worth it and you will be reminded of a lot of the big acts from back then because every song could be on one of their albums or be written by them. Mr. Lordi‘s voice is just making it typical Lordi. Going from ‘I’m Sorry I’m Not Sorry’, ‘Bent Outta Shape’ with it’s various tempos again, ‘Evil’ (the one track of this album that made it to the ‘Killection‘ compilation) and ‘Vulture Of Fire’ – you get permanently hit by the sledgehammer.  At the end it has it’s closing with an outro named ‘Beastwood’. This is a strange mixture, fully in contrast to the music before. Again like a cut-out of a movie soundtrack with Lordi doing some “barking”, as I would call it. Horrible contrast to the music before.

This part of the collection is just awesome – you’ll enjoy it if you like proper heavy/thrash metal – fast and driving but not too thrashy all the time, knowing when to slow down a bit and just get heavy. Great listening to it and getting together a lot of bands in your mind but never copying, always staying uniquely Lordi. You’ll listen to it start to end and will enjoy it every time!