Review by criscool623 on January 2, 2024.

After giving this album its necessary listenings, it's time to talk about my latest deception so far.

Oh, Havok. I still remember when I discovered them with that good "Time Is Up" album. It was aggressive, well performed and the vocals were completely insane. I considered myself as a Havok fan since that moment, and when Conformcide was about to be released, I was excited to listen to it, but we all know the result: an unnecessarily complex and pretentious technical thrash attempt with very few interesting things and longer than it should be.

When the single Phantom Force was released, I was really eager to listen to and talk about this album. I thought that Havok had recovered that strength lost in Conformicide, but when the album was released, my illusions turned into a great disappointment and frustration.

The topic that everyone is talking about on "V" is the plagiarism of songs, and I won't deny it, it's one of the worst problems of the album. Although the "Post-Truth Era" introduction is one of the most notorious and obvious plagiarism, I still consider it as a kind of homage. Which is unforgivable is the total rip off of "Hit the Lights" in the song "Fear Campaign". It's the most obvious and shameless plagiarism of the album, and it's just insulting for the listener. This is one of the worst mistakes in this album, but not the only one.

"V" is plagued by songs that are SIMPLY BORING. From "Betrayed by Technology" to "Interface with the Infinite", the album is insufferable owing not only to the songs' slowness but also to the fact that those songs are devoid of interesting ideas to the listener. There's an attempt of experimenting with different forms to perform their instruments, but it just makes the album feel longer than it should be. "Panpsychism" and "Don't Do It" have the same problem (at least the latter one has a decent ending showing a little of aggressiveness, but it doesn't worth listening to the first 5 minutes of the song for a little good thing). It's just weird for a thrash metal band. It feels pretentious and it shows the little idea that the band has on what they are doing.

On the other hand, there are few good songs that you could extract from the album. Despite the introduction of the song, "Post-Truth Era" is actually a decent song and a good introduction to an album that could have been better. "Phantom Force" and "Cosmetic Surgery" are the best songs from the album as they are brutal and pretty competent. "Merchants of Death" is moderately decent; it can be listened, but don't wait for a marvel.

The album is so bad that it doesn't even deserve a better review than the one I'm writing. It's boring, devoid of interesting ideas and not worthy to listen to. Listen to the songs I already highlighted and run away from here. Don't dedicate more time than the one this album deserves.

Rating: 3.9 out of 10