Vocalist Kyle Thomas went back to also playing guitar in 2020 and the lineup of Jason Viebrooks – bass, Sasha Horn – drums have welcomed into the fold, former Cannibal Corpse guitarist Pat O’Brien.  No need to go over what lead to Pat’s exit from CC – you all know about it and the man has struggled a lot, but also started to put the pieces of his life back in order.  Due to his past charges, Exhorder, is still navigating the touring waters, in terms of the countries they can play if he was to make the trek with them.  I am gearing up to see their upcoming tour with Vio-Lence and Deceased which should be quite awesome.  Their last album was 10 songs in 52 minutes, with quite a lot of long-ass songs.  The new one is 12 songs in 54 minutes so you can see they have streamlined the writing process quite a bit, but is it better than their predecessor?  Read on to find out….

“Wrath of Prophecies” starts things off and if the band wants to open with a new song, rather than an older one, this is the way to go.  The song starts off thrashy right from the beginning and Kyle does do some of his style on the slower moments as he does with Trouble, some of that crooning and cleaner style, but it’s so catchy.  Mainly he is his thrash vocalist, piss n vinegar self.  Vicious.  The signature Exhorder guitar tone is on full display.  Crisp, clear and crunchy AF.  There are some little ditty blast beats going on too, with excellent drum rolls.  Halfway through the song some cool guitar soloing going on and the songs picks up the pace with that soloing, no doubt Mr. O’Brien making his mark heard loud and clear on this.  The ending of this song is beyond intense with scorching blasts and a monstrous slow down that will have people hammer fisting two-stepping all damn day in the pit.  This folks….bands……is how you begin an album.  Talk about making a statement!  Wo Wo Wewa!!  “Under the Gaslight” is next and allows you to catch your breath.  More of that Southern groove metal vibe going on, very heavy with some more great guitar soloing happening.

“Forever and Beyond Despair” brings back the aggression with the fast-paced and heavy thrashing, as well as mixing in slower and broodier moments.  Excellent double bass drums on this track and a lot of old-school thrashing pacing moments with more solos from Pat.  You’re going to really enjoy the old-school moments with the galloping speeds on this song.  Truly a highlight for me, as well as the full-throttle brutal thrashing.  “Year of the Goat” is a brilliant song with its thrash speed and I love how it starts off, with the production scaled back, and then once the thrash hits, BOOM, the volume is cranked up and with this high-speed pacing and chorus, I cannot imagine Exhorder not playing this song live.  I expect to see tour shirts printed and available on tour for this track.  Killer mid-paced moments with old school galloping speeds and full-throttle thrashing madness.  One of the best songs the band has crafted since their return.

“Defectum Omnium / Stolen Hope” is the longest song at over seven minutes and calls to mind the over nine-minute title track from the last album, which was the final track on that one.  This is a moody number, slow, and heavy, with a variety of vocal styles.  It’s a heavy song, but maybe 2+ minutes too long for this writer’s taste.  However, it does come smack dab in the middle of the album to break things up a bit.  “Desensitized” has a lot of tempo and vocal shifts.  The song is slow, fast and medium-paced at times and is an excellent song to boot.

There you have it and yes Defectum Omnium tops their last album.  This is more streamlined and much more aggressive than the last album.  The production is so damn killer with all the instruments and vocals mixed to perfection.  The album cover is a mixed bag.  I’ve seen variations of this cover on prior albums, like Deicide’s Till Death Do Us Part, from 2008 and Sarcofago’s Rotting from 1989.  Black and White covers sometimes get lost on me, but the art is creepy and the band logo, in white, sticks out.  I would have thrown some red coloring on this cover, but what the hell do I know?  What I do know is this new Exhorder album has been in constant rotation for me and is one of the best albums of 2024, thus far.  Absolutely scorching!

With their New Orleans roots intact Exhorder bring forth that southern downturned dirge heaviness, which I am unfortunately not the biggest fan of, but when done with the Exhorder sound, well then it’s different for me, but only in smaller doses, which is not the case with this album, at certain points. Opening with the furious “My Time” it’s pretty damn clear Exhorder went about this return album the right way. Get a great label-Nuclear Blast, check. Let us get the best modern recording we can possibly get to bring that Exhorder heaviness to the front-check. The song begins with tight and fast precision thrash with the definite, more polished, Exhorder guitar razor sound. The tune slows a bit and then picks up the speed and Kyle sounds a bit different, singing in a higher register, however very angry and pissed off. He really sounds great on this album, no doubt.

“Asunder” is next with that groove heaviness and this song has a very Exodus feel to it. Think “Blacklist” off Tempo of the Damned. But anyway “Asunder” is monstrously heavy with some crooning style vocals from Kyle. You know he had a stint in Trouble a few years ago where he experimented with his vocals a bit and he has brought some more of that melodic edge to this. The chorus on “Asunder” is catchy and some cool southern flair guitar solos thrown in. Yeah, this song is heavy as shit. “Hallowed Sound” is next and the song goes into the first Exhorder blast beat ever. This opening is so intense and faster than when Jim “The Slimmer” woofed down 10 personal pizzas from Lenny’s Clam Bar, on Long Island, back in the 90’s, all the while screaming, faster, faster, faster. Regardless the blast ends with some tight drum rolls before going into a groove section that is super heavy. Excellent riffing and super catchy shifts from heaviness to melodic tinged choruses. I would have liked the song to get back into the faster moments, but it stays in this groove pattern for the rest of the song.

The thrash is brought back with “Beware the Wolf”. Over the fast thrash parts the guitars not once get lost in the mix and the song. This song is furious from start to finish. It actually stays thrashy all the way through which I am very happy about. Some of the slow down moments are super killer, though. Real beat down worthy. Then Mourn the Southern Skies takes a bit of a downward turn, with some fair to middling types of songs. “Yesterday’s Bones” at over 7 minutes is 3 minutes too long. Melodic, still heavy, but the song looses me. A bit boring. “All She Wrote” and “The Arms of Man” are all just mediocre. Like the band ran out of steam. “The Arms of Man” does have some ass-kicking groove moments though. “Rumination” and the blazing “Ripping Flesh” are brilliant, especially “Ripping Flesh”. Super heavy, fast, great solos and snarling vocals from Kyle.

Then it’s on to the 9+ minute ender, “Mourn the Southern Skies”. This is pure southern groove metal and while it’s got catchy moments, the song is so damn slow and I get lost at certain points. It is a moody piece I will give Exhorder that, but the song is way too long and stays in this slow dirge for the entire length of this extra long song. Let’s not go back n forth about the Exhorder and Pantera crap from the 90’s, but this title track sounds like one of the slower, moodier songs on Pantera’s The Great Southern Trendkill, seriously. I do commend Exhorder doing this real expansive song, because it is emotive, melodic and heavy.

Mourn the Southern Skies is a damn fine return from Exhorder. The production is slick and polished but retains their signature guitar sound. Too many songs overstay they welcome and at 10 songs and over 50 minutes is a bit too long. They do mix in a lot of great parts and I do wish there were some faster songs on this album. The musicianship, though is excellent and Mourn the Southern Skies is the best produced album for 2019-no doubt. Because the album cover is so dark when I first saw it I thought it was marshmallows roasting on a scarecrow. Closer inspection shows it’s voodoo doll and the marshmallows are skull heads. My bad. The booklet is nicely put together and Mourn the Southern Skies is a good Exhorder album and at times is brilliant. For me the albums are in the order of strongest to least strongest in terms of the years they were released, however this is most definitely an Exhorder album. I am glad to have them back in the scene-it’s damn heavy!

Both titles will be released by Metal Mind Productions on 19th May 2008 in Europe / 8th July 2008 in USA (via MVD). New digipak edition is limited to numerated 2000 copies. Digitally remastered using 24-Bit process on golden disc

Exhorder
“Slaughter in the Vatican” (remastered)

Label: Metal Mind Records
Cat. No.: MASS CD 1177 DG
Barcode: 5907785032422
Format: CD Digipak (limited edition of 2000 numerated copies)
Genre: thrash metal
Release date: 19.05.2008 Europe / 08.07.2008 USA

Tracklist:

1. Death In Vain
2. Homicide
3. Desecrator
4. Exhorder
5. The Tragic Period
6. Legions Of Death
7. Anal Lust
8. Slaughter In The Vatican

Exhorder
“The Law” (remastered)

Label: Metal Mind Records
Cat. No.: MASS CD 1176 DG
Barcode: 5907785032415
Format: CD Digipak (limited edition of 2000 numerated copies)
Genre: thrash metal
Release date: 19.05.2008 Europe / 08.07.2008 USA

Tracklist:

1. Soul Serch Me
2. Unforgiven
3. I Am The Cross
4. Un-Born Again
5. Into The Void
6. The Truth
7. The Law
8. Incontinence
9. (Cadence Of) The Dirge

Bio
The origins of Exhorder reach all the way back to 1985, when five guys from New Orleans – Vinnie Labella (guitar), Andy Villaferra (bass guitar), Chris Nail (drums), Kyle Thomas (vocals) and David Main (guitar) – decided to do something more with their lives than just hanging out and drinking beer (not that there’s anything wrong with that) and formed a thrash metal band. They kicked off with a self-released six-track demo “Get Rude” in 1986 which instantly became famous on the local scene. Back then Exhorder helped shape the specific “Louisiana sound”, shared between various groups from that state. The band often mentioned the big influence their homeland had on their music. In an interview for Look Around Zine in 1991, the guys mutually agreed: “It all comes from living in Louisiana. For some reason people think Chicago is the blues capital of the world. They’re wrong. Mississippi is where the blues were made. That’s where the old black slaves were sittin’ there on their front porch singin’ about how fuckin’ rough they had it. About how their wives were gettin’ fucked by their masters… So growing up in this area gave us a really acute outlook on music and musicianship in general. It ends up coming out in our songs”.
In 1988 Exhorder managed to record their second demo called “Slaughter in the Vatican“, but shortly after releasing it the band split up. However, as Kyle Thomas commented in an interview for Thrashcore Zine in 1989: “Actually I’d rather leave it at this: During this time a few of us had different ideas about music and personal situations, but we’re back together doing better than ever as we progress into our field of writing and performing.” With Jay Ceravolo replacing David Main, the band reunited just in time to be noticed by Roadracer/Roadrunner Records and sign a contract for their first full-length release.
Exhorder re-recorded all the songs from their second demo and added one additional track – “The Tragic Period”, this forming their first official album – “Slaughter in the Vatican”. Due to the controversial cover art (which featured the pope being dragged by an angry mob to be executed by hanging) and lyrical content, the LP was strongly criticized by the Catholic community shortly after it was released. However, the band was far from apologizing for their anti-religious attitude, stating that the message of the album contained much more than a simple mockery of the Catholic church: “None of us were brought up in a religious fashion,” – said Ceravolo in the interview for Look Around Zine – “our singer and drummer both went to Catholic schools… and they saw all the hypocrisy of the catholic religion. We’re anti-religion in general, though. If you can’t dig within yourself to find something that’ll keep you rolling, then fuck it man. It’s more than just “religion’, the word, though. We don’t like what it stands for. We’re not satanic either – we’re against anything organized. We just used the pope as a symbol. We figure he’d be the best, to get our point across”. Apart from the controversial content, the album featured a true feast of insane riffs, pummeling drums and aggressive vocals by Kyle Thomas, who was soon dubbed by the critics “one of the most pissed off voices in thrash”. While the songs weren’t in any way revolutionary, they brought a dose of brutality that most thrash metal bands could only dream about. Tracks such as “Homicide”, “Exhorder” and “Desecrator” attacked the listener with authentic rage, while the slower “Legions of Death” took him back to the past to face the classic Black Sabbath vibe. But perhaps the most significant composition was the controversial tune “Anal Lust” with some of the most vile and nasty lyrics in the history of thrash. As Ceravolo commented on this track: “That’s like the first song we ever wrote and it’s not meant to be serious. We went over and toured Europe and every show, everyone wanted Kyle to write down the lyrics to “Anal Lust”. Roadracer and our singer talked and just decided that it’d be best if we let people try and figure them out for themselves.” The album was produced by Scott Burns, a scene veteran well-known for his work with such acts as Sepultura, Obituary, Death, Cannibal Corpse and Decide. Burns did an outstanding job with “Slaughter in the Vatican“, bringing out the group’s most brutal and aggressive side and enclosing it in a thick and bruising sound. Nevertheless, many reviewers argued that the album was strongly inspired by Slayer. “The Slayer influence isn’t as big as the hardcore influence, actually.” – said Ceravolo. “We were into the Dead Kennedys and stuff like that. Kyle sings and phrases things really fast. People think he gets it from Tom Araya, but he actually gets it from the D.K.’s and Henry Rollins and stuff.” Asked about the huge amount of violence in their songs, Ceravolo replied: “A lot of the violence you hear in our songs is actually violence we think of and feel. It’s just that we can’t do it. I’d rather be playin’ music than sittin’ in jail.”
In 1992 Exhorder returned with a follow-up album entitled “The Law“. Instead of delivering a typical thrash metal record, the band ventured more into groove metal regions, making the compositions slower and more technical, but not in any way less aggressive. “The Law” borrowed a lot from other genres as well, such as jazz or funk (just listen to the bass slap in “Un-born Again”!). Kyle’s vocals became more melodic and emotional, but in the same time angrier than ever. With songs like “Soul Search Me”, “Unforgiven” and “I Am The Cross” Exhorder took a new step in their music, focusing on more complex songwriting rather than straight-forward aggression. But that didn’t make the follow-up any less heavier – “The Law” is still a thrash album first and foremost, even with the amazingly performed cover version of Black Sabbath’s “Into the Void” that is included on the LP. Apart from the music, also the lyrical content showcased a slightly different perspective, concentrating more on politics. As Ceravolo explained: “We hate politics. This world is fucked, especially America. It’s totally fucked. Just read the newspaper to figure that out. And we’re just out to fuck it up even more; to play on the fact that things are fucked up. Instead of trying to make things better, and talk about the good things we feel more comfortable talking about the way things are…” Although strongly differing from the debut, “The Law” became a highly acclaimed release among the fans and was often compared (and by many considered superior) to Pantera’s “Vulgar Display of Power“.
The album’s release was followed by a promotional tour in Europe, but after that Exhorder decided to call it quits. Their music was simply lost in the flood of Floridian death metal and the upcoming grunge invasion. Vocalist Kyle Thomas went on to form a stoner rock band Floodgate and did some live performances with Trouble. He is currently the lead singer of Alabama Thunderpussy. Guitarist Jay Ceravolo formed Fall From Grace, while drummer Chris Nail devoted himself to the music business and is the co-owner of the 7C&M Music Center in Los Angeles.
While during their career they were rather overlooked, Exhorder resurfaced years later as a thrash metal legend, highly praised by heavy music enthusiasts for their two amazing albums. Rumors of a reunion still echo around the metal scene, but as always – nothing is certain. For now, feel free to dive into the roaring depths of “Slaughter in the Vatican” and “The Law“, two deadly pools of bloody thrash metal madness!!