REASON

Stop me (please!)

Two years after releasing their self financed debut, Anacrusis returned to the studio to record this follow up. In the band's own words, "Reason" represents the band "finding their identity". Unlike the first album, which was made up of old and new material, "Reason" started with a blank sheet, and was built up from there.

Once again in the band's own words, the last two songs written for the album "Stop Me" and "Afraid To Feel" formed the "blueprint" for what was to follow on subsequent releases. That said, they themselves admit that these tracks are flawed, and did not turn out as intended. The other tracks here tend to be more in line with what went before on the debut.

The album opens with the aforementioned "Stop me", a pounding, heavy 6 minute riff driven number with sudden soft passages and mood changes. It is certainly the band's most adventurous arrangement to date, but unfortunately the overall impression is rather muddled. "Afraid to feel" follows a similar style, but is heavier and more intense.

While, as mentioned, the majority of the tracks fall into line with the style adopted on the band's debut, there is a slight degree of refinement here. We still have the heavy lead guitar riffs and solos, but the songs themselves do not tend to have the same dark tones (especially in the titles!).

Overall, I must admit I found this release rather disappointing after the raw excitement of the band's debut. The recording quality has certainly improved, but the fact that this was another rushed effort is rather apparent. Best avoided.

Reason is the second studio album from American progressive metal band Anacrusis. Their debut album called Suffering Hour was a raw thrash metal album with no progressive tendencies whatsoever, but with Reason the band shows us a more sophisticated side of themselves.

The music is still basically old school thrash metal ( Slayer, Metallica, Kreator, Sodom, Destruction, Testament, Xentrix, Vio-Lence and Forbidden just to mention a few) and IMO of the boring kind. What makes the music a bit out of the ordinary is the acoustic parts which appear in some songs. It kind of adds a progressive touch to the songs. The two longest songs on the album the opener Stop Me and Afraid to Feel are by far the most innovative songs here. The rest more or less sounds like most of the songs from Suffering Hour.

The musicianship is somewhat doubtful here. There is nothing wrong with the guitar and bass playing. Pretty well played thrash metal riffing, but the vocals from Kenn Nardi are not very good and his weird screams don´t fit the music very well. The terrible eighties drums are the worst part here though. Mike Owen does not know the word subtle. Everything is played loud and without much consideration for the other parts of the music. His playing really ruins the music IMO.

The production is terrible. The drums are too loud and the overall sound just comes out sounding weak and powerless. This was a common problem for many eighties thrash metal bands though.

Reason is not much better than Suffering Hour really, but we are introduced to the more innovative side of Anacrusis music and that´s a plus in my book. Reason doesn´t deserve much more than a 1 star rating, but as I do respect the urge to make innovative music I´ll give Reason 2 stars. I´m stretching though and I won´t recommend this album to anyone.