So, how is it? Lovely thanks. It’s not treading down any new territory, but it’s nice to hear some great riffs again. Chuck Billy mixes up his more commercial vocal style ie a nod to Metallica, with a more death metal like grunt. And of course, Dave Lombardo plays on this one, doing what he made his name doing, laying doing a thunderous and awesome beat. The thing with this style of music, much like all I guess, was that after a while the ideas left bands, and we were just left with "the riff". Which everyone was using. And it’s a risk that Testament obviously run. Luckily they’ve managed to package things into some great songs, remembered little bits of light and shade stuff and so it retains the attention. Highlights for me are D.N.R, 3 Days in Darkness with it’s glorius chugathon riffing, melody and ohwhoh singalong and especially Fall of Sipledome which just has a great riff that switches between two styles through. Simple but highly effective. And it’s when you hear great things like this that you remember just how great the thrash scene really was

If you’ve not listened to this style before, why not give it a shot. Add a little variety to your musical lives. Nice one. Makes me wonder why I deserted them in the first place, but hey, that’s what I did.

Serial Thrilla Vol IV. Century Media

Another of the Century Media mini-samplers.

Moonspell I was under the impression were gothic. Well the inclusion of some electronic sounding drums and those deep deeeeeep kind of vocal doesn’t really gothic make. It’s ok as a song, nothing stands out. At least it didn’t go on as long as Type O’Negative do.

Next is Stuck Mojo. A band that I dunno kind of flatter to deceive to an extent. This is taken from the live album, and in Not Promised Tomorrow, they highlight on of their better songs. It’s just that they’ve also got a hell of a lot of ordinary songs. Dunno, live they’re always pretty good, and maybe the full album showcases that and a collection of their better song.

Next is Scheitan with a track called Marionette. No idea of anything about this band. Chugs along quite nicely, some nice touches around the chorus. Would’ve benefitted from a more melodic vocal than it gets, which are semi-growl semi-shout sort of thing.

Skinlab offer up a Bad Brains track, The Messengers, apparently from a Bad Brains tribute. Don’t like tribute albums anyway, and sorry only original Bad Brains should be allowed. It’s of course a good song, and delivered well as a song in it’s own right. It’s just not right here because it should be done by the BB and no-one else.

Next are Haste with The Absentee. Again, I know nothing about this band. Nice enough riff there, sounds a bit nu-metal. Sounds like different vocalists doing their thing. Not too bad.

Runemagick are next, with a track called Dreamvoid Serpent. Guess what? I know nothing about this band. Ha, a pattern emerges! Vocally sounds like they’re going at that death metal sort of thing, but the music is more interesting and doom laden and with bells in there.

Zonata contribute Dream Child. Guess what? I’m not even bothering to say it. Sounds Euro metal like to me. Speedy, melodic, Michael Kiske like vocals and melodies.

Finally a band I do know something about. Exodus, with the title track from the live Another Lesson In Violence album. Yeah, maybe I should invest in this one after all. Been a bit wary cos all this kind of "let’s reform and see how it goes" malarky, ending in a live album sounds suspect to me. But they do sound as if they managed to recreate things pretty well.

I guess the ultimate test for these kinds of things is whether they encourage you to go out and buy any of the albums by the featured artists. Me personally? Must admit I’ve not bought any at this point in time.

Anyway, this starts off with the band monkeying around (sorry, I had to do it, I’ve been stressed and these things just pop out) doing an impersonation of Steven Hawking as they introduce first track Fish For a Quid. The great thing about the Monk is that although there’s no guitar here, they manage to make the bass guitars sound distinct and create a full sound that means there is no need for guitar. I can’t explain. You need to listen for yourself. Sure, there’s elements of Primus running through their music, and if the thought of Primus scares you or turns you off, then you may struggle. But there’s a song here, and they manage to bring it all round. Try it, go on, you know you want to. There’s such a variety of music out there. Don’t believe all the doom mongers bemoaning the lack of a scene in the UK.

The final track is the 9 minute bassathon with Rothko. Much like the Rothko album, which is reviewed elsewhere in here, 5 basses actually work. It’s not a noisefest, there’s stuff like melody in there. It’ll be hard for some people to get their heads around, but then that’s the whole Monkey sound for you. And it’s one of the things that appeals most about them.