Review by Elijah on April 28, 2020.

The 1990's, a terrifying era for thrash metal because most of the bands converted to a rock/alternative sound or filler thrash. Sure, Renewal may fall victim to not being pure thrash, but it's definitely not a bad album, not at all.

My absolute favorite part of this album are the drums. They sound absolutely amazing, the snare is solid, tight, poppy, and it fills in every beat and measure greatly. You can't ever go wrong with a solid and amazing snare, absolutely beautiful. The guitars do have a thrashy sound, but rather than being used to create pure thrash riffs and songs, it's designed to have a more laid back and restricted feel and focuses more on the pure sound rather than ability. I suppose you could call this "industrial thrash metal", this is Kreator's first experimental album, and thankfully it's not bad.

When thrash bands try out new things in the 1990's it's usually a shitshow, but gladly Renewal isn't. It's far from a shitshow actually, this is truly a beautiful album and it's really overlooked and mislabeled as a "flawed 90's 'thrash' album". The songs display a huge array of emotion, and it really does speak to me. Whenever I'm in a sad mood, or a chilled-out mood, or even when it's raining outside and it's fucking peaceful and relaxing, this album is perfect for any of those scenarios, especially the rain. Match made in heaven. The simplistic riffs do their own thing throughout the songs and the album, and the more you listen the more you'll appreciate it all. I'd say to fully appreciate and see the true beauty of this album, you have to be in the right setting or a certain state of mind. Like rain, a perfect example. It's just an album that absolutely FITS with an atmosphere like that. It's simply gorgeous, can't really form it into words.

The standout tracks are for sure 'Winter Martyrium', 'Renewal', 'Reflection', and 'Brainseed'. Pretty much the first few songs are the best standout ones, even though every track is realistically. 'Winter Martyrium' is a pretty flexible song, it has several different sections and it's pretty cool. It gives me happy and positive upbeat vibes and I love the drum patterns on it. 'Renewal' is where it starts to get more emotional and where the beauty starts to stand out. The start of the song has a few hallowed strums of guitar with drums that follow, the beginning of that song makes me think of a setting where you're in a city, or a big deserted area, and it's raining and you're all alone. It just makes my head expand and think about the settings each song depicts. The main riff of the song is catchy and pleasing to the ear. 'Reflection' sounds like you're walking in the middle of a small blizzard/snowstorm, you're going against the tough weather while the harsh snow is being blown everywhere all around you, a lengthy challenge, but it'll be all worth it at the end point. 'Brainseed' is a pretty in-itself track, the main aspect of the song is a metallic-sounding smack/hit that's basically a beat that repeats itself over and over. It's simply catchy and it's the main hook of the song. These 4 tracks are the greatest parts and are the backbone of the album that start it off properly and in a good direction.

There may be best tracks that stand out the most compared to others, but pretty much every track has all the elements that I previously described. Every song matter, every song is cool. Nothing really fails here, the band manages to properly maintain an ongoing formula.

The tone of the guitar followed by the song structures and patterns in every song creates a little story or experience I should say. I just think this is entertaining and catchy, I like listening to the whole album and going on a cool adventure and waiting for all my favorite parts, it's an intriguing experience that's super fun and makes me feel an array of emotions. Especially when you're in the right setting, it'll HIT THE SPOT.

Renewal isn't all that bad, it's an album you have to get used to and spend time with to understand it. Is it absolutely perfect? No. Is it terrible? Not in the slightest. Every track has a personality, some may be a little lazy, but at some point in any of the songs it'll have something interesting, and that's fine. Kreator wanted to try something different, and it's not bad. Experimental doesn't ALWAYS mean bad, this is a prime example. Renewal is an acquired taste that's appreciated only by a certain amount. I love this album and I always will, definitely one of my top favorites by Kreator. 

Rating: 9.5 out of 10                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         

Review by Alex on August 4, 2020.

A snake! look!, advancing from the sea, its hiss and rattle inciting disturbia, its stare paralyzes, and its bite anoints the soul with evils old. Vassafor will consume you, extinguish the light from all corners of your soul and enslave your mind. This has been the story since comrades of Temple Nightside and the abominable Grave Upheaval first set foot on sanctified grounds. The excitement ushered in with the announcement of the band's next lethal installment, To the Death, is beyond measure. A one-hour ceremony in adoration of forces unseen but felt far too often to ignore or be deemed nonexistent.

Set for an August release alongside Temple Nightside's "Pillars of Damnation", To the Death strikes the listener as not only the most corrupt and spoilt fruits of Vassafor, but also a record within its own league of ritualistic death metal.

'To the Death' may be the best death metal song I've heard so far for the year. Its wicked, riffs are served up buffet style, and the drumming has so many variations it's impossible to have asked for more. I'm also interested in finding out who's the woman on the spoken samples, her presence ups the vilification on this track, though a bit of a seductress tone is emitted from her voice. Then starting out as a 2nd wave black metal march, 'Egregore Rising' transforms with a surreal movement into something more complex and unpleasant. Still with the touch of compositional adept and the vocal taint of the serpent merchant himself VK, it demonstrates Vassafor's long standing ability to go from strength to strength in-so following up a flawless introduction with a song equipped in all departments with the mighty ichor of Vassafor.

No disrespect, but To the Death makes bargain-bin black/death metal sound like Sunday-school church music. The fumes radiating from this thing are sickening; a twisted, contagious, pelting of obscenities indiscriminately. You aren't safe even when behind cover, the potency is much too strong to be evaded. Take 'Emanations From the Abyss' or the monolithic, 'Singularity', those tracks alone could squash the alleged 'efforts' of countless bands trying desperately to create worthwhile black/death metal. They form so innocently with hidden intentions to the naive, then like a serpent, they strike venomously with sections mustering only to exert their most vicious and instrumentally elevated compositions.

A shift occurs on 'Emanations from the Abyss', the vocals here are not the same as heard throughout the rest of To the Death, I really don't think these are VK's vocals, nevertheless they sound fitting considering how the overall tone of the album sounds starved of the bass, so the vocals slice instead of crush. Meanwhile, 'Singularity' escorts the listener through halls of horror, featuring strange ambient sounds of creatures it seems and a continuation of the splendid riff wizardry, execrable tongues and pestering drumming.

I've always had admiration for the distinction of the bands in that Australian and New Zealand circles being Grave Upheaval, Temple Nightside, Ill Omen and Impetuous Ritual. Each has a sound and method characteristic to themselves. These bands share members but have not forgotten to give each entity its solitary identity. Vassafor in particular takes the scenic route to their destination with releases jumping the boundary of 1 hour. Vocals nurtured within the stomach and uttered through the teeth and guitar riffs that straight slaughter. Their methodology sounds like they are trying intensely to decrypt the engraved sigils on some ancient artifact excavated from the depths of Egyptian soil.

At a point To the Death had been neck-in-neck with Malediction in terms of musicianship; however, better riffs pushed the material over the threshold of what the previous entry accomplished, thus making To the Death, Vassafor's best and most successful undertaking to date.

The tapestry of this ailing wanderer continues to hold dearly the keys to a dominion of unforgivable mischief guarded by Iron Bonehead Records.

Rating: 9.7 out of 10