NAPALM DEATH: Time Waits for No Slave

Produced by Russ Russell and Napalm Death

Released: 2009

It's not for nothing that Napalm Death are still the masters of grind after so long. Time Waits For No Slave is another example of why these guys are one of the greatest and most important metal bands of all. This is almost an hour's worth of relentless ferocity, a trademark never-ending assault of sonic obliteration.

Since returning to their grindcore roots following their departure from Earache, Napalm Death has released consistently strong and powerful volumes of unadulterated chaos. Time Waits for No Slave is no exception, opening with the punk-flavoured attack that is "Strong-Arm". After that, Mitch Harris throws down some catchy technical death metal riffing for "Diktat", without doubt this album's stand out track. Then come "Work to Rule" and "On the Brink of Extinction", two more all-out grind assaults that make the opening third of Time Waits for No Slave a memorable one. After this, Napalm Death gets both a little experimental and downright gloomy, reeling in the pace almost to a drone in the title track, with Barney emitting a refrain that's almost partly sung. The dalliance is only brief and actually a little odd. "Limb From Limb" follows in the same dark vein before the surprisingly technical "Downbeat Clique", a strangely rigidly-structured track from Napalm Death.

The second half of Time Waits for No Slave isn't quite as engrossing as the first. The contrast between Harris' death-metal flavoured tracks and Shane Embury's hardcore-styled ones keeps things from getting boring but there tends to be a feeling of sameness about it as it crashes to an end. At 14 tracks and 50 minutes in length, this does start to wear out its welcome a little. Both Napalm Death's previous studio albums were shorter and had more songs, making this release something of a real endurance test, especially the digipak version with two bonus tracks that takes the playing time up to a minute shy of an hour.

When all is said, however, this is still Napalm Death. It pummels and pounds from the moment it begins with a ceaseless noise terror and is easily as good as anything they've done in the last ten years.

1. Strong-Arm
2. Diktat
3. Work to Rule
4. On the Brink of Extinction
5. Time Waits for No Slave
6. Life and Limb
7. Downbeat Clique
8. Fallacy Dominion
9. Passive Tense
10. Larceny of the Heart
11. Procrastination on the Empty Vessel
12. Feeling Redundant
13. A No-sided Argument
14. De-evolution Ad Nauseum

Rating: 82%

NAPALM DEATH: The Code is Red... Long Live the Code

Produced by Russ Russell

Released: 2005

With the sad demise of Nasum, this was without doubt the political grind album of 2005. As the world seemed to turn more to the Right every day and as the spectre of an Orwellian nightmare loomed over the West like never before, it probably wasn’t that surprising that Napalm Death would unleash one of the angriest volumes they had recorded in a very long time.

Stripped down to a four piece following the departure of (the now sadly late) Jesse Pintado, the originators of grindcore make a partial return to the nihilistic sound of their earlier days here, and it’s a devastating, unrelenting assault on conservatism and Right Wing hypocrisy and falsehood, an unbridled and unyielding attack on the powerbrokers in Washington and their fabricated war on freedoms masquerading as a battle to save them. If there is one single current album that encapsulated the common resentment of conflicts based on lies and the restrictions of liberties for the benefit of security, The Code is Red… is it. This is socio-political grind at its best: “So called champions of the poor/Tax us against the wall” Barney Greenway roars in “Pay for the Privilege of Breathing”, “Full frontal assault on your choice/to spurn the flag/Waves of retribution awaiting those who dissent” he continues in their condemnation of the Patriot Act, “Climate Controllers”.

Hatebreed’s Jamey Jasta, Jeff Walker from Carcass and California’s favourite dissident Jello Biafra all add their weight to this raging slab, arguably Napalm Death’s finest moment in a decade.

1. Silence is Deafening
2. Right You Are
3. Diplomatic Immunity
4. The Code is Red... Long Live the Code
5. Climate Controllers
6. Instruments of Persuasion
7. The Great and the Good
8. Sold Short
9. All Hail the Grey Dawn
10. Vegetative State
11. Pay for the Privilege of Breathing
12. Pledge Yourself to You
13. Striding Purposefully Backwards
14. Morale
15. Our Pain is Their Power

Rating: 90%

NAPALM DEATH: Leaders Not Followers: Pt 2

Produced by Russ Russell
Released: 2004

If ever a phrase has suited a band, ‘leaders not followers’ suits Napalm Death like a glove. The originators of grindcore have bowed to none throughout their career but here once again, one of the world’s greatest ever extreme metal bands pays tribute to a long list of others that were also leaders in their field. From hardcore to thrash to death metal, the band has gathered 19 songs from 18 bands and given them the Napalm Death treatment: brutal, crushing and uncompromising.

Albums of covers can be dodgy affairs, especially when bands try to tackle material that doesn’t suit them, and many of them have cropped up over the years mainly as contract-fillers and a lot of them can be lousy. This one is not. It certainly helps that a lot of these songs could almost have come from Napalm’s own catalogue: ‘War’s No Fairytale’ by Discharge, for example, The Offenders’ incendiary ‘Face Down in the Dirt’ – one of the clear highlights here – or Anti-Cimex’ ‘Game of the Arseholes’ with its classic “Take your fucking cross and stick it up your arse!” line (one of their early bassists, Jim Whiteley, plays on the first and last of these). Other songs like Hellhammer’s ‘Messiah’, Kreator’s ‘Riot of Violence’ – one of the longest songs this band has ever recorded – and Sepultura’s ‘Troops of Doom’ could have been a stretch, but they’re not. Napalm Death handles them all with the respect they obviously hold for them, even Wehrmacht’s ‘Fright Night’, which seems impossibly melodic for this band.

As far as albums of covers go, this is one of the best. Leaders Not Followers: Pt 2 is ugly, savage and uniquely Napalm Death.

1. Lowlife
2. Face Down in the Dirt
3. Devastation
4. Messiah
5. Victims of a Bomb Raid
6. Fright Night
7. War's No Fairytale
8. Conform
9. Master
10. Fire Death Fate
11. Riot of Violence
12. Game of the Arseholes
13. Clangor of War
14. Dope Fiend
15. I'm Tired
16. Troops of Doom
17. Bedtime Story
18. Blind Justice
19. Hate, Fear and Power

Rating: 85%