Review by Greg on September 26, 2024.

We've all been there, at least once: a band strikes absolute gold with an album, then inevitably fails to recapture whatever made it so great, as if not even they themselves were sure how they did it in the first place. Lightning in a Bottle aims to cover those (usually debut) albums that turned out to be one-time feats for their respective bands.

We all hate when that happens, right? You find an album that ticks all the right boxes for you, only to later discover that everything else the band did after (or even before) just does nothing for you. And though I began to find several examples in my library, enough to start my first, and likely only, mini-series about it (of undefined duration, for the time being), I couldn't really help but open it with the most egregious example I can name off the top of my head: Exmortus and their debut LP In Hatred's Flame. A debut album is always a magical place where a band gathers its best strengths, skills, and, most of all, songs after a certain number of years spent in the local scene, making shows and releasing demos. In Hatred's Flame is all that and then some, given the huge potential displayed by the ambitious guys already in their early years. In a certain way, it's unique not only for the Exmortus' discography but also for the whole metal scene. Hellish thrash/death metal with neoclassical shredding all in one? Consider me interested!

Based on this premises, In Hatred's Flame by all means looks like one of those flashy albums where everything is constantly thrown at you and it's all style and no substance, and it would sound exactly like that except for the fact that it has, you know, a whole lot of substance. I don't know if it's all these flames in the title, flames on the cover, flames here, flames there that have conditioned me since I first caught sight of the artwork, but the atmosphere is incendiary, and the certainly not polished production actually enhances that impression with a little extra sulphur. The ear-catching feature is obviously the leadwork, courtesy of the frontmen Conan and Balmore. With more than one solo exceeding one full minute in length, some may start to get redundant but when they get it right... oh boy. Seriously, I always adore it when a band places a tempo change right in the middle of a solo, but 'Triumph by Fire' is basically that technique perfected and unsurpassable, with even that famous neo-classical lick masterfully leading the transition between its two parts. I can probably name a lot of bands that couldn't keep me interested for more time than the cumulative amount I spent replaying that solo alone. Boner-worthy material.

Make no mistake though, the riffwork is no slouch either. Granted, the album tries a lot of things and the initial triplet of tracks shows it quite clearly, but even the more 'conventional' tracks succeed, being basically your average re-thrash tunes under the influence of a massive dose of Exmortus steroids. 'Onward to Battle' and 'Onslaught' are the obvious examples of this and, needless to say, they will establish a close relationship with your neck... a painful, if rewarding, one.

Really, the only downside I see, and it has arguably a lot to do with the fact that I'm not a musician, is that I usually find myself skipping the instrumental track, 'Axes of War'. I have a few doubts that it would be orgasmic to see Conan and Balmore playing it right before your eyes, but I view it as the only moment on In Hatred's Flame that lets self-indulgence take a front seat, and the whole front row altogether. It's especially unfortunate when taking into account that it's basically an enhanced version of a Coroner instrumental (I think specifically of 'Arc-Lite', but with fewer dynamics), so I should love it to death, but alas (or, better... thank God), the math doesn't work in this field. Luckily, the album more than bounces back to huge heights with the two closing tracks – 'Wrath of Vengeance' and, especially, 'Fimbulwinter' – both masterpieces of their own kind.

Comparisons? Now that's a hard question. They occasionally remind me of a thrashier and more battle-oriented The Crown, but that's probably more due to all the speed limits they constantly break than for actual similarities in sound; although the largely unorthodox drumming of Mario Moreno is probably one of the few I can name able to rival Janne Saarenpää's crazed playing. Interestingly, some passages (i.e. 'War Gods') are reminiscent more of old-school melodeath (Hypocrisy, At the Gates) than typical thrash. Beneath the lava-oozing guitars rumbles a bass constantly afraid of remaining in the background for too long, even if newcomer Daniel Duarte finds only one solo spot, if a quality one, introducing 'Valor and Might'. Rounding off this hostile landscape are ferocious vocals residing somewhere between Chance Garnette, Joel Grind, and a more extreme version of what Andre Hartoonian exhibited, not without disappointment, on Being and Nothingness. They don't steal the scene (hey, not that any of us expected, nor hoped, for it, I guess), but easily add another inflammable layer to the ensemble.

So, yay! everything is neat and exciting! But what about everything that followed?

Exmortus are now at their 5th album and yet, as crazy as it may seem, none ever approached the gloriousness of In Hatred's Flame. Admittedly, they didn't help themselves by following it with the controversial Beyond the Fall of Time, which however arguably laid the rails for the following of their career. Said album showed a polished, sterile production job, toned-down riffing, and, above all, worsened vocals (due to the loss of Balmore), with some embarrassing falsetto screams thrown randomly on top of it. You could kinda sum up all of it by saying that they were starting to restrain their early, deliciously chaotic hybrid within more conventional boundaries, and it already sounds like a failure. Still, Exmortus had, since then, decided to discard even the few death influences left on the sophomore (read: the best things going for it), opting to sacrifice a sound that was unmistakably theirs and becoming more of a thrashy b-tier Skeletonwitch clone (a band that I'm already not exactly fond of) with the occasional Malmsteen-inspired moment of wizardry here and there. Note that their later albums are not necessarily *bad* – but rather just thoughts for different fans (as confirmed by the fact that nobody who reviewed this album ever took the time to write wonders about any of the others).

So, in short, another album like In Hatred's Flame will never be done, in all likelihood. But, on the upside, it's still a monstrous album and it hasn't lost an iota of brilliance even after many years and listens. What more can you ask for?

(Fun fact: before this album, Balmore was in charge of the 4-strings, with Artak Tavaratsyan of Hexen fame teaming up on guitars with Conan. If that wasn't the definitive modern thrash lineup...)

Rating: 9.3 out of 10