[avatar user=”Mosh” size=”50″ align=”left” /]Always nice to revisit a former Band of the Day to find they’ve got something new out. I recently had a shout from InasniteR’s Petros to let me know that they’ve just released another bundle of songs under the title Half Faces. Well, to be precise, he has released another bunch of songs as InsaniteR is a one-man project!
The album is already out and features Petros in all musical positions and on vocals. InsaniteR was a three-man outfit until 2013, but has continued as a solo project.
For your cash you get nine tracks of nice, simple old-school thrash metal. Production quality isn’t the best, but for those who’ve followed thrash since those early days, that’s part of the charm. What you have hear is a band/man who’s intent on releasing a staggering amount of material. If the trade-off is a reduction in audio quality then it’s worth it.
If you remember those halcyon days of home-recorded demos then you’ll know what to expect. Petros has put his heart and soul into this recording, and there are some great riffs coming out that wouldn’t be out of place in a more professional production. Guitars are nicely crunchy, and the vocal style is more Nuclear Assault than Metallica on some numbers, while more Celtic Frost on others.
Indeed, one thing that comes across in the album is the variety of influences. Rather than just go for one style, Petros has touched on may with a near death-metal feel to a couple of the songs.
There’s no denying the songwriting ability on here, and I’d love to hear what Petros could do with a full band and a bigger recording budget. Every classic band we all know started out doing stuff like this – there’s no denying that the same inklings are present within InsaniteR.
Highlights for me are “Vengeance of Gods” for it particularly heavy feel, mixed guitars and atmospheric interlude partway through; and “Chuck and Cobra” for being silly fun.
