ABSOLUTION – The Remission Of Sin

The American Metal scene has been many times accused of following trends like NuMetal and the latest addition of Metalcore. Thankfully, there are still some bands playing the traditional Metal sound that was born in the mid-80s. The latter also pertains to the five-piece band from sunny Southern California, Absolution, with their debut EP, The Remission Of Sin.

The band was formed in mid-2004 by the guitarists Chaz Leon and Benny Del Rio, and drummer Chris Mason. Their music influences can be easily tracked down to the classic Bay Area Thrash Metal sound, with low tuned guitars, fast drumming, and aggressive vocals.

After a small spoken intro, the Thrash Metal attack commences with the solid neck-snapping rhythm guitar riff in the first track entitled “Armageddon.” The vocals follow the dominating performing style of Marcel “Schmier” Schirmer of the mighty band Destruction. These guys have definitely managed to reproduce the sound that has been moving slowly, but steadily, towards oblivion. “Erase” takes the lead, and maintains the previous momentum. The vocals are slightly different due to a cleaner sound. The mid-tempo pace of the song enhances the heaviness to the max, taking the listener closer to the time when Bonded by Blood was released by the Exodus machine.

Mr Arevalo deserves some credit for his performance behind the drum kit during the next track of the album, “The Servant of Liars.” The headbanging rhythm of this song can provoke thoughts of the all time concert classic behaviors like mosh pitting and the forbidden stage diving. Here, Deroscher’s voice wakes some memories from the very early days of Slayer, when Tom Araya was singing “evil” lyrics when Haunting The Chapel was released. Some catchy melodies and riffs can be heard while listening to “Savior,” a trait that adds more points regarding sound diversity.

“Seven Deadly Sins” comes to prove that the list of musical influences shown within the promo sheet were absolutely true in that Metallica was one of them. Indeed, Deroscher’s melodic vocal lines have distinct references to James Hetfield, the well known singer of the aforementioned band.

This fine collection of well-composed songs closes with the Maiden-ish 8-minute “Human.” These guys have by far succeeded in bringing their personal music preferences into Absolution’s sound without being a copycat situation. The structure of this song gives the impression that it was composed by merging one instrumental (the first 3 minutes) and one typical Absolution track (the remaining 5 minutes).

This is a self-financed release, justifying the rough sound production. Actually, the rough production has in some strange way helped the band to approach even more of the classic Trash Metal era sound because this was the sound someone could normally find in the past for this type of album.

It’s difficult to predict whether or not this band will manage to convince a record label that they should be signed, because the band’s sound is without commercial interest. On the other hand, it should convince all the true Metal fans out there, who have missed this sound, to go to the band’s official site where this demo, The Remission of Sin, is freely distributed!