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Razor - Shotgun Justice

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    Ian Jane
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  • Razor - Shotgun Justice



    Razor - Shotgun Justice
    Released by: Relapse Records
    Released on: May 5th, 2015.
    Purchase From Amazon

    The second of Relapse Records' reissues of classic Razor albums sees the 1990 album Shotgun Justice gets the special edition treatment. The lineup of Dave Carlo on guitar, Adam Carlo on bass and Rob Mills remains intact but vocalist Stace McLaren had been replaced by newcomer Bob Reid on this record.

    The loading and subsequent blast of a shotgun starts off the opening track, Miami, with a literal bang. The thrash attack is in full force, and Reid's vocals almost instantly remind us of Kurt Brecht from D.R.I. and that's not such a bad thing. That sort of strained, angry vibe that Brecht brings to his music is here too, so it fits and Miami sets things off on a high note.

    From there? United By Hatred takes things in a different direction while still sounding very much in keeping with Razor's thrashtastic sound. It's got a thicker groove to it but the shredding is still there for sure. Violence Condoned is kind of an awesome song about the toils and tribulations of trying to put on a show and the dangers inherent in doing that type of stuff - not getting paid being a big one of those dangers. Violence condoned, cough up the dough! This is one of the heaviest tracks on the record for sure. Electric Torture fits in nicely here, Meaning Of Pain as well, both stand out as quality, well played and entirely pissed off thrash in the tradition of the band's earlier material. Again, Reid's vocals are different than McLaren's were, there's a lot less of the piercing metal scream going on and his range is more limited, but he does 'pissed off and fed up' really well.






    Stabbed In The Back is another kick-ass track from what is essentially a really strong record from the band (they'd definitely found their sound by this point in their career). It's just over two minutes in length and it's pretty damn bombastic. It's a track about staying true to your roots and not selling out and it definitely fits in with their style and their mantra. The title track is a nasty, heavy song about a bar fight gone very, very wrong - it starts off with a slower, heavy build but you know that won't last and after a minute or so of that it spends a solid two minutes in a storm of anger.

    Parricide and American Luck are both fairly standard stuff for Razor, which is fine. More thrash, more speed, more anger, the later track opening with the only bass solo on the record (it's quick one but it counts). Brass Knuckles, like United By Hatred, starts off with a sort of heavy groove, the band's sound fairly minimalist and at times doomy, while Reid's vocals are cleaner and clearer here than anywhere else on the record. This is almost a NYHC sounding type of song, it could have come off one of Agnostic Front's more 'metal' sounding albums. Burning Bridges brings things full circle again, as Reid goes on about wanting to party til dawn in downtown Toronto after quitting your job. There's trouble to be found there for sure - fuck the man!

    Concussion is two and a half minutes of more focused anger, while Cranial Stomp is just violence in sonic form. Good stuff. The last track on the original album itself is The Pugilist, the longest track on the record at just under four minutes. It builds nicely from a mid-tempo sludge to a traditional thrash style over the first minute and then spends the last three just beating you in the face. Good times.

    Bonus tracks on this reissue include some interesting additions from Razor's archives. We get a live version of The Meaning Of Pain recorded somewhere on the Shotgun Justice Tour in 1990 and a live version of Violence Condoned recorded at a Toronto show a year prior in 1989 (Reid is introduced as the new singer). Learning And Refining Cranial Stomp is a minute and a half of what is obviously a demo of some sort where the band is literally doing just what the title implies. We also get the original mix of Miami (which is more raw and maybe a little more heavy than the album version), and alternate versions of Electric Torture and Brass Knuckles, also a little more raw and a little less polished than the final versions used on the record.




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