STONEHENGE

This is a particularly brutal tour de force of the Ruins landscape circa 88-89. Almost every track features a corrosively distorted, heavy bass sound and a drum sound that cracks and thumps through your skull like a marauding band of medieval brutes. The violence in these songs is sometimes chilling, evoking images of harsh and bloody battles, epic journeys through impossible-to-survive conditions, or any other such grueling and costly predicament. But not every song is so dark, and several of the ones that are still captivate with their beauty and/or horror. The album is bookended by two amazing and crushing journeys, "Big Head," and "Infect." The former is a great composition shocked by a lightning fast climax, and the latter has one of the nastiest, growlingest opening themes I have heard. "Thebes" is close behind these in its volcanic power (but maybe this one is more like a slow and terrifying ooze than a galloping ambush). "Hail" is a welcome oasis of simplicity, and "Holebones" is one of Ruins' rare melodic rockers, with a charming vocal delivery. The darker tunes have the shredding and screaming vocals that are the trademark of earlier Ruins releases. The sheer volume of tracks makes this a hard one to listen to straight through, but the quality of the selections make it worth having. A good step for anyone wanting to wade in deeper than "Burning Stone," "Hyderomastgroningem," or "Symphonica."