Cross The Threshold

Since I have just done a review of Loudblast’s Sublime Dementia, I thought I should do justice to its follow up the Cross The Threshold mini album since they both were recorded within a year of each other. This mini album consists of a couple of new tracks No Tears To Share and Cross The Threshold which are my two favorite Loudblast tunes so far. In addition to these two new tracks, the guys re-recorded the song Malignant Growth from their 1989 first album Sensorial Treatment. They also added the title track of their third album Sublime Dementia as well as a re-recorded version of Subject To Spirit from Sublime Dementia here in a rather shorter version. They also came up with a cover of Mandatory Suicide from Bay Area metal god thrashers Slayer.

As I said above, their two brand new tracks No Tears To Share and Cross The Threshold are my all-time favorite Loudblast songs. Those songs clock respectively at 6’38 and 5’44 which make them longer than the usual four to five minutes which are average for Loudblast songs. Those two songs are a lot more heavier and groovier than the usual fast death metal songs and a lot more balanced. The band incorporated some keyboards and very little female vocals. Stéphane Buriez’s vocals remains in the tradition of growled death metal vocals, while the rhythmic section is getting stronger. Hervé Coquerel delivers another phenomenal drum performance (new version of Subject To Spirit) and both guitarists Stéphane Buriez and Nicolas Leclercq (who is now replaced by Alex Colin Toquaine from Agressor) team up again to come up with some great rhythmic and lead guitar work.

This is the time when Loudblast started to focus on the flesh matter as depicted on the amazing cover art done by Polish artist Bolek Budzyn and later developed to its paroxysms on their album Fragments. I am an animal and my instinct wants me to copulate. I am a man and my instinct wants me to enjoy sex. I guess this is explicit enough. Rien n'est affreux en libertinage, parce que tout ce que le libertinage inspire, l'est également par la nature (Nothing is dreadful in libertinage, because all that libertinage inspires, is also by nature). Marquis de Sade (1740-1814).

The recording of this album was done in France at C.M.A. Studio in Valenciennes. The production, done by Colin Richardson, is better than what Scott Burns did on their previous full length. You don’t need to travel ten thousand kilometres to achieve a great results. Just hear the difference between the new version of Subject To Spirit and the Morrissound version of Sublime Dementia. If someone has never listened to this band, then I suggest one starts with this mini album.