Review by Carl on October 15, 2026.

Although 90% of their releases fail to capture my imagination, I do have a lot of respect for the German record label Dying Victims. Not because said releases are bad- far from it actually- but I'm just not that big on the whole 80s revival thing. Despite this personal opinion, I will happily admit that the Dying Victims releases without exception look and sound absolutely amazing, so much so that many underground labels could pick up a thing or two from Florian and his venture. Now, me not taking to what a lot of their artists are doing doesn't automatically mean that I will discredit everything the label puts out, though. When their releases do manage to strike that dissonant chord in my heart, they hit the mark full target, delivering the goods without fail! To illustrate what I mean, I will happily point to recent(-ish) stuff released by bands such as Cutthroat, Destructive Elite Terror, and Atonement, to name a few, vomiting forth some absolutely awesome slices of thrash/death/black terror. And as of recently, we can add Austria's Ludgar to that line up as well. Which is nice.

As is probably expected, there are no big surprises offered here, just a solid dose of blackened thrash metal in the ways of School of Old. The band plows through a solid-sounding dose of gritty grinding riffing that gives all the proper salutes to the early releases of heroes of the olden days such as Bathory, Venom, Voivod and Whiplash. There's nothing too technical or overly ambitious on display here, just Ludgar laying down a savagely pounding dose of straightforward metal. Spurred on by a drummer that opts primarily for a forceful punk-ish drive, proceedings gallop throughout the album's runtime at a primarily brisk pace, never skimping on power and force, but delivering their brand of atavistic aggression with oodles of conviction. At times the foot goes off the accelerator to allow for some variation to seep into the mix, and even when doing this, Ludgar still delivers the goods in style. Add in a slash of primitive blast beats here and a dash of black metal dissonance there, and you can bet that this band has you by the balls in no time, all the while maliciously threatening to tear 'em off if you don't submit to their brand of vile and gritty thrashing debauchery. Top it all off with a good dose of reverb-drenched vocals, and there you have a honking dose of fittingly obscure-sounding metal. Granted, it may be a trait that has been done to death by now, especially in this particular genre, but Ludgar makes it work.

Makes it work for the most part, that is. Although the vocals are delivered in a way that sounds deliciously deranged and evil, the singer drops the ball somewhat in the track 'Fire And Wrath'. Halfway in the song, the vocalist starts wailing like a drunk dude singing half-remembered sea shanties in an empty corridor, and I'm not gonna lie, it ain't pretty. It's nothing disastrous in the end, and being the only instance of it on the album, I'll write it off as an honest mistake. Feel free to call it nitpicking on my behalf, but once I heard it, it kinda blew the track for me.

One could make the argument that Ludgar does not reinvent the blackened thrash/speed metal wheel on this album, but in my opinion they don't need to. The forceful music speaks loudly for itself, aided by an excellent performance by the band and a powerful production devoid of any modern trickery. It's a way solid dose of metallic mayhem sure to satisfy any and all who sold their souls to the sounds of those formative black metal bands of days gone by, and that is about all that I personally desire from an album like this.

Although I wouldn't mind if they left the drunken sailor at home next time.

Rating: 8 out of 10