ATRONADOR – Atronando Mentes

Atronador (Thunderous) from General Rock, Rio Negro , Argentina are one of many Old School Thrash Metal bands that keeps on pouring out from South America. This band like their Argentinean companion Thrash Metal acts continues the works of Hermetica, which they are themselves, drawing their influences from American Thrash Metal, especially the Bay Area kind. Atronador seem to be fond of Slayer, in regards to their Thrash Metal music drive along with Heavy Metal elements here and there.

This five-piece band began only less than a year ago, bearing the sign of “We Are Old School Chums” over their heads. Still unsigned, the band released at the end of 2008 their first demo, Atronando Mentes (Thunder Mind) , which unleashed Old School Thrash in all of its past glories. After hearing this release, one thing was sure, this band has got to be signed, Argentina needs more Hermeticas. Atronador Mentes is for everyone to hear even if you don’t understand a word in Spanish – Thrash Metal is Thrash Metal in all languages.

Musically, Atronador are quite a Slayer driven band. Their sound quality is quite impressive for a demo and its sounds like Slayer’s Hell Awaits and some similarities to South Of Heaven, so there is no doubt that the 80s factor rules here.

The main characteristics taken from Slayer are all the instruments except the vocal line. The guitars are gloomy and the solos are screaming out evil, the drums are also mellow and gloomy with a definitive Lombardo touch of the mid 80s. Solos are not as crazy as Slayer’s but the band can be proud of their guitarists’ abilities. In general, Atronador are not original , but it doesn’t seem to interfere with their efforts and you can see it while listening. These guys have to ability to do it big, especially their lead vocalist who shows talent as a screaming banshee while using raspy tones.

Another thing worth mentioning is the cool bass work around the demo. The bass player makes various lead and solos parts and it seems like he is leading the music all together just like Cliff Burton used to in Metallica, there aren’t too many bass players like that today.

Highlights of the demo are the opener, “Explosion Mental” (Mental Explosion), which starts banal with the raining storm and all but turns into a great thrasher with Speed Metal bits and interesting rhythm lines that has some NWOBHM touches.

“Bajo Tension”  (Under Tension) , starts with an amazing bass solo under dark guitar riffs, this one , musically, a Slayer type song taken from 1985/6. The vocal line is excellent.

“Acechado” (Stalker) , a nice catchy blend of the Old British Metal with Slayery type of Speed madness. This song was also featured in the W.Y.A.T show and presents Atronador at their best performance.

Atronador are not short of being a successful band. They treat their Old School roots very seriously and making the best out of them. The Metal world should wait anxiously for their first LP / EP – because they have great potential.