CHILDREN OF TECHNOLOGY

With most of us hoping to make it through Christmas without contracting the dreaded plague and breathing our last to the strains of MARIAH CAREY, gung-ho partying might be slightly less prominent on our agendas this year. But nobody said it was non-festive to get horrifyingly drunk in isolation and headbang until our brains dribble out through our throbbing ears, did they? Good.

Listen to the new CHILDREN OF TECHNOLOGY album and you may forget the last 12 months, imagining instead that the world is soon to be ruled by beer-swilling, mutant cyborg overlords, riding giant motorcycles and playing guitars made from human bones. "Written Destiny" ticks every filth-related box a diehard metalhead could wish for, tapping into the same demand for primal, ugly and antisocial heavy metal that has made the likes of MIDNIGHT, WHIPSTRIKER, HELLRIPPER and many more such essential listening in these sonically sanitized, cookie-cutter times.

Opener "Soundtrack of No Future" is a nuts-out heavy metal banger, hewn from the granite of the greats but underpinned by a filthiness that owes its churning guts to the usual suspects: VENOM, DISCHARGE and MOTÖRHEAD. "Creation Through Destruction" cranks up the thrash and speed metal tropes, barreling along at a breakneck, punk rock lick, vocalist DeathLörd Astwülf (possibly not his real name) barking and belching his way through a series of spittle-spray threats.

Epic by most comparable bands' standards, the title track absolutely reeks of the mid-'80s, with gang vocals, D-beats and a mid-song breakdown riff that would give SCOTT IAN sleepless nights. Similarly, "The New Barbarians" is pure metal bravado, as ghostly grandeur erupts into all-out hardcore war. Overall, these songs offer a joyously unapologetic hybrid of everything that discerning folk know to be true to the spirit of, dare I say it, real heavy metal. And real punk rock, for that matter. CHILDREN OF TECHNOLOGY are nothing if not accommodating.

In truth, they're also obnoxiously exciting. "Warpainted Nightcreatures" deserves a spot in any credible 2020 list of top speed metal songs, not least because it manages to sound like THE EXPLOITED and EXCITER at the same time. Similarly, "Wasteland Cratediggers" is punk-meets-metal in excelsis: razor-slash riffing meets Neanderthal drums and an exhilarating sense of unstoppable momentum, as someone rides a Harley through your living room amid a shower of beer cans and pep pills. A bonus old-school horror flick synth outro is a neat and classy touch, too.

The perfect soundtrack for shotgunning vodka through the hollowed-out skulls of your enemies, "Written Destiny" goes for the throat from thuggish start to apocalyptic finish. It's definitely not subtle, but it gets the job done at maximum volume. Bottoms up.