V (Havok album)

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
V
Havok's studio album

Publication
(s)

1st May 2020

Label (s) Century Media

Genre (s)

Thrash metal

Title (number)

11

running time

45 min 51 s

occupation
  • Guitar, vocals: Reece Scruggs
  • Bass , vocals: Brandon Bruce

production

Mark Lewis

chronology
Conformicide
(2017) 		V -

V is the fifth studio album by the US thrash metal band Havok . It was released on May 1, 2020 via Century Media .

Emergence

In 2019, bassist Nick Schendzielos left Havok again. His successor was Brandon Bruce, who comes from the circle of friends of the musicians. Bruce should submit a video that shows him playing. After the previous album Conformicide failed progressively, the band wrote shorter songs for V. The total playing time of the album is also around a quarter of an hour shorter than its predecessor.

Singer David Sanchez explained that the band did a lot of experimentation in the studio, using a variety of guitars , amps , microphones and cymbals . Each member contributed ideas for the album. The focus was on meaningful and catchy songwriting. V was produced, mixed and mastered by Mark Lewis. A music video was made for the song Phantom Force , which begins with a warning of a possible seizure .

background

Track list
  1. Post-Truth Era - 3:54
  2. Fear Campaign - 3:58
  3. Betrayed by Technology - 3:44
  4. Ritual of the Mind - 4:10
  5. Interface with the Infinite - 4:03
  6. Dab Tsog - 1:15
  7. Phantom Force - 3:00
  8. Cosmetic Surgery - 4:24
  9. Panpsychism - 6:29
  10. Merchants of Death - 2:46
  11. Don't Do It - 8:08 am

In the song Post-Truth Era , singer David Sanchez criticizes that facts don't seem to matter much anymore. The abundance of information and disinformation on the Internet makes it difficult to determine what is truth and what is not. In addition, a few people would control most of the mainstream media. According to Sanchez, these people often have no interest in telling people the truth. The beginning of the song has parallels to the song Blackened by Metallica . According to David Sanchez, the song had the working title Justice , a reference to the album ... And Justice for All , which featured Blackened .

The song Ritual of Mind is a call to become aware of the connection with nature again. According to singer David Sanchez, many of the mass-prescribed drugs would not be necessary. Instead, more natural medicine should be used to improve mental health. The song Phantom Force is about mysterious sleep paralysis deaths that afflicted members of the Hmong people for a time . The people had to flee their homeland and suffered a terrible fate. In the music video, the band wants to show the fear the Hmong lived in at that time. Don't Do It is a song against suicide . Sanchez read a statistic after three times as many children committed suicide in the past decade as before. Sanchez hopes the song will encourage suicidal people to rethink.

reception

Frank Albrecht from the German magazine Deaf Forever described the music of V as playful and compositionally valuable Thrash Metal and praised the well thought-out and critical lyrics by singer David Sanchez. However, the slapping on the bass would be annoying. Albrecht awarded 8.5 out of ten points. Marc Halupczok from the German magazine Metal Hammer praised the fact that the tightening of the songs “is audibly good for the material”. Havok would “not reinvent the thrash wheel”, but with an album like V “the world is perfectly fine”. Halupczok awarded five out of seven points. Ronny Bittner from the German magazine Rock Hard wrote that the band “steered their experimentation in a more orderly way”. He attested Havok "musical sophistication", but the band would "not come close to classics" like Coma of Souls , Rust in Peace or Symbolic , which showed how one can " combine technical demands with hooks ". Bittner awarded 7.5 out of ten points.

Chart placements

Charts Top ranking Weeks
Chart placements
Germany (GfK) Germany (GfK) 48 (1 week) 1

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Ronny Bittner: Remain skeptical . In: Rock Hard , May 2020, page 76
  2. ^ Matthias Weckmann: Stoic hooligans . In: Metal Hammer , May 2020, page 53
  3. ↑ a b HAVOK Releases 'Phantom Force' Music Video. Blabbermouth.net , accessed April 20, 2020 .
  4. ↑ Frank Albrecht: Committed to the truth . In: Deaf Forever , issue 35, page 63
  5. ↑ Frank Albrecht: Havok - V . In: Deaf Forever, issue 35, page 96
  6. ↑ Marc Halupczok : Havok - V . In: Metal Hammer, May 2020, page 96
  7. ↑ Ronny Bittner: Havok - V . In: Rock Hard, May 2020, page 96
  8. ↑ officialcharts.de