EXODUS

Protective clothing and helmets on, folks. There is a new EXODUS album and it is an absolute fucking beast. "Goliath" has certainly been a long time coming, with Gary Holt's extracurricular activities with SLAYER and a now almost inevitable lineup reshuffle causing delays along the way, but once the masters of Bay Area destruction are truly ready for action, there are still witheringly few bands capable of keeping up with them. Thrash metal is necessarily hard, fast and ferocious music, but the band's twelfth album of new material arrives with the expectation that no one else is likely to hit this hard. The return of vocalist Rob Dukes may not have had any real effect on the songs themselves, but his excoriating screech has brought fresh fire to the EXODUS formula and coupled with yet another avalanche of prime Holt riffing, the San Francisco veterans sound unstoppable and genuinely dangerous here. "Goliath" will smash your skull to bits and set fire to the shards, grinning maniacally throughout. This is heavy metal at its most vicious and uncompromising, and the perfect soundtrack for another year of (sadly inevitable) global chaos.

In several recent interviews, Gary Holt has stated plainly that the new EXODUS record was shaping up to be one of the heaviest in the band's career. Mission accomplished. "Goliath" is ruthlessly contemporary, with a sound that revels in old-school spirit, while also bringing thrash kicking, spitting and screaming into a new era of sonic violence. The vitality and aggression that made "Bonded By Blood"the definitive thrash metal statement is here in abundance 40 years later, but while many comparable bands cling loyally to an old-school aesthetic, EXODUS have consistently embraced the tones, textures and maxed-out brutality of the modern age. Even more so than on the 2021's "Persona Non Grata", this band are hell-bent on making music that schools new generations. As the opening "3111" confirms, EXODUS can still go toe-to-toe with any much younger band, but with the additional benefits of over four decades of hard-won experience.

This kind of militant belligerence simply cannot be faked. The riffs are steel plated and ravenous, the vocals are startlingly ferocious, and the balance between pit-friendly accessibility and scabrous, discordant punishment has seldom been more deftly executed. EXODUS are masters of their craft, and "Goliath" is simply their latest demonstration of superiority. On the seething, foot-to-the-floor carnage of "Hostis Humanis Generis" and "Promise You This", Dukes's incensed roar is a sublime match for the relentless torrent of malicious riffs spewing from Holt and Lee Altus's guitars. On the eccentric battery of "2 Minutes Hate" and the murderous myopia of "Violence Works", EXODUS scythe, smash and carpet bomb their way to easy victories. And on the incendiary and sinister title track, they prove that thrash metal can be just as effective and ruinous at a slower pace, as riffs grind together like wayward tectonic plates. Brooding and weirdly soulful on the spiteful grooves of "Summon The God Unknown", explosive and reassuringly ugly on "Beyond The Event Horizon"; these songs are designed to incite riots and cause mass outbreaks of concussion. It is all ridiculously thrilling.

"We started out with nothing, when the shit all hit the fans," Dukes rages on the closing "The Dirtiest Of The Dozen". "We begged, borrowed and stole, to support out fucking band!" The unerring dedication that has powered EXODUS over the last 40-plus years is writ large across every one of these barbaric acts of gleaming metal purity. Thrash metal is for life, and EXODUS are its most righteous standard bearers. "Goliath" is what happens when the passion never deserts you, and the hunger to get heads banging and fists pumping grows stronger by the year. Listen to it at excruciating volume and get ready for a life-threatening adrenaline rush. This monster lives!