Album Review: Witchery - “Don’t Fear The Reaper”

Almost right from the get go, I realised that the sonic output from “Don’t Fear The Reaper” sounds at times like a dead ringer for The Haunted’s “Made Me Do It”. Of course this isn’t surprising considering that the main songwriter is rhythm guitarist Patrik Jensen who made large writing contributions on The Haunted’s first two albums.

Late in 2006, “The Dead Eye” came out sounding like The Haunted was going through a midlife crisis, not knowing exactly what to play as long as their “experimentation” toyed with mainstream ideas. Hearing “Don’t Fear The Reaper” really makes up for it in a lot of ways, and yet one has to wonder since Patrik Jensen who seems to have such a signature sound in The Haunted didn’t get to contribute any songs to their last album.

It’s nice to hear the slight variations on evolved thrash in this modern era, since it is making a comeback. That being said, there are two problems with “Don’t Fear The Reaper”. The first is the lack of fast songs, as most of the album is a collection of mid-paced songs with a constant double bass rolling along, which at times drives the message home. The other problem of course is that many of us already have “Made Me Do It”.

3/5

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Witchery At Century Media