8

Ancient Battle Cries

Venom are back for another knockabout blast of punk infused metal on their fourteenth(!) studio album and fifth since their reformation in the early part of this century. Obviously, the band are best known for coining the black metal genre on their seminal second album Black Metal, however, they were left behind in ideology and brutality by the infamous Norwegian wave of black metal bands in the late '80s and early '90s. Venom's music in their early career was notable for its enthusiasm as much as its technical limitations and the band have always had a Bash Street Kids meets Spinal Tap vibe about them but they have been undoubtedly dogged in their determination to keep recording and touring as they approach four decades as a going concern.

After their first two records, the aforementioned Black Metal and its predecessor Welcome to Hell became canonised by the metal community the band experienced numerous line-up shifts and musical decline before a split in the mid-nineties metal doldrums. This didn't last too long though as an eventual reunion of the original line-up occurred before they reverted to type with singer/bassist Cronos now steering the ship as the only original member.

Cronos, now backed up by drummer Dante and guitar player Rage in their traditional power trio format, delivers a modern sounding amalgam of extreme metal touches - the habitual 'in league/at war' with references to Satan continues their confused position on Old Nick - friend or foe?, plenty of speed and aggression and Cronos' straggly growl but if you don't know what they sound like or what their outlook is Long Haired Punks should clear that up.

It's a straightforward metallic attack bolstered by a punk tempo and structure and frankly, crap lyrics. The 52 year old Conrad 'Cronos' Lant bellows that they're "Screaming aloud, fucked up and drunk. Y'all watch out, we're the long haired punks, yeah!" and to underline their adolescent conception of being in a metal band: "We blast metal, no hip hop or funk, demons from hell, long haired punks." Black metal not black music, right? Elsewhere they're killing big band leader Kid Creole on The Death of Rock N Roll, "Light up the Marshall stacks we're killing Kid Creole." I'm not sure what exactly he has done to deserve such a fate but he'll not be happy to be snuffed out by middle aged metal musicians that's for sure.

The remainder of the lyrics tend to stick to the very 20th century heavy metal framework of anti-religious babble, biblical references and more general aspects of death and supernatural horror. Musically there's more of mixture than before - alongside the speed metal and Motorhead bass lines there's a Ministry esque industrial stomp on the Jesus hailing Crucified and Evil Law has a similar, minimalist slog. There are also elements of a previously eschewed flash on From The Very Depths especially when guitarist Rage opens up space for a shred like on The Death of Rock N Roll, the tightly coiled leads on Temptation and the frilly opening to the thrashing Grinding Teeth.

Venom have kept their old grime and ridiculousness while welding on some fancy, new metallic parts and it makes for an entertaining record musically but the stance of just laughing at them as metal buffoons doesn't really work. Maybe it's the case that, just as the band have aged, the joke has too and is now a fairly worn Christmas cracker gag that elicits groans rather than guffaws.