Palmy’s premier metal act Imperial Slave are back with their brutal third album ‘Existential Threat’, which was produced by Waldemar Sorychta of Grip, Inc. and recorded at the good old Stomach.
The album kicks straight into top gear with Soldier Slaves, and the tightness of the playing is as impressive as the vocals are screamy. Singer Sam Sheppard (8 Foot Sativa, Sinate) certainly brings the intensity. It actually just intensifies as the album goes on.
With song titles like The Stabbing and Satanic Elite, this is in many respects an album that does what it says on the tin. You know that you can expect – pummelling metal with lyrics that dwell on the darker side of life. Having said that, there is real light and shade on display here, and repeat listens certainly reveal a depth that may surprise. For a song with such a horrific theme, human sacrifice, For the Gods has an almost playful instrumental second half that you would be hard-pressed not to groove along with. This War has a great acoustic intro with a kind of Eastern scale feel to it. There’s some cool harmonised guitar in False Flag and Satanic Elite.
The rhythm section is impressive throughout, always tight and chock-full of energy. This is not an easy thing to get across on a recording.
And let’s not forget – the band isn’t advocating for darkness, they’re only pointing out greed and corruption where they find it. In this way Imperial Slave can be an Ethical Salve. Suffer/Survive delves into selling off the health system… “Profit not patients.” Rather appropriate as, at the time of writing, voting has just opened. Just saying.
If you’re tiring of harsh metal guitars that threaten your hearing, this might be a great local product to try. Somehow they’ve managed to make an album that’s so heavy it would snap your arms like twigs if you tried to lift it, while at the same time the mixing and mastering is superbly balanced and not harsh at all. Are the guitars distorted? Hell yes. But they aren’t piercing or ice-picky. It’s not very often you get to write a sentence like this, but it’s true – the chuggy guitars in The Sounds of Ethnic Cleansing are bouncy and fun and not harsh at all. Try it, you’ll see!
