Album Review: All Against – Straight Down To Hell
Reviewed by Matthew Williams
When I initially read the promo for the latest release from All Against, it had a “for fans of” Kreator, Havok, Evile, etc attached to it, so I immediately dived straight in and picked it out. However, after listening to the album titled track, I wasn’t feeling that sort of comparison, as I don’t recall Kreator recording many songs over 9 minutes long that were this atmospheric and dark.
“As I read between the lines” are the first spoken words by vocalist Henrique Martins, as the Portuguese quintet lead the way with some sort of battle hymn, but slowly but surely, you hear the double bass from Ricardo Tito and the rumbling bass of Luis Silva, and I start to think that this is going places. And then it hits you square on the jaw, with the initial guitar riffs from Bruno Romao (rhythm) and Sergio Correia (lead) during “Inner Mayhem”. That aggression and ferocity is there in bucketloads, igniting a fire under the band and the pounding the drum gets during the scintillating solo will keep all moshers extremely happy.
Portuguese metallers All Against are a band that I’m not overly familiar with but when listening to “Nacao Valente e Imor(t)al” they are growing on me more and more, I can hear a bit of new style Testament in the vocals and rhythm, which isn’t a bad thing at all. You get that anger in Martins vocal, which leads to a break, as the bass ticks along nicely and then you get stung by a controlled solo that fills the song exceptionally well. It’s not chaotic or over the top with too much whammy bar, but then it goes all nuts and erupts everywhere, taking me by surprise but in a good way.
“Narrow Streets of Disgrace” comes out like a drunken fighter, punching all in its vicinity, but you sense an anger pouring out, with superb drums again from Tito, driving the song to towering heights. It’s short and potent in its delivery and leads into a shorter and more aggressive song called “Nepotism” which is my favourite as it has everything you need from a metal song. Brute force, great tempo, enraged vocals and an awesome solo. This is going to hurt a lot of people’s necks when they try and headbang along to it, especially with the impressive nod to Slayer’s “Angel of Death” towards the end.
The chaos continues with “Out of the Box”, and I like the initial guitar sounds, with the band saying that “each track represents our passion and dedication to our music”. The results are clear in the finished product, and it has that touch of 80’s thrash about it which continues into “Professional Hater”. They are like a wrecking machine pounding away aiming to destroy all in its path, and “Upside-Down Humanity” sees it all come to fruition, with a bulky bass sound, crunching guitars, striking solos, bruising drums and hefty vocals leading the final charge on their metal journey.
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