From Spartanburg, South Carolina, comes Krotalus, a Possessed/Destruction-inspired proto-black thrash homage that shares members past and present with death metallers Lecherous Nocturne. The first few times I listened to this, I wasn’t terribly impressed. I found Blood Offerings to be just another retro-thrash tribute, and I was all set to sigh and write up another review detailing how I own Kreator records and don’t need rewritten copies of them. But somewhat to Krotalus’ credit, as I dug a little deeper, I unearthed a minor sleeper of a disc that stuck with me a bit longer than I’d initially thought.
Initially, the biggest turn-off was vocalist Chad Bradley’s yelping growl, high-pitched and chattering, and I felt that, while its origins in Beccerra and Schuldiner and Schmier are evident, it sounds like a washed-out version of those innovators. There’s also a lack of motion to some of the tracks—a lack of dynamics—that makes anything less than a dedicated listening experience sort of a blur of prototypical thrash riffs and drums. But if you’re willing to sit down and really listen (headphones helped me), this album is a pretty good little slice of the old-school.
The opener “Conquered Kingdom” is largely to blame for my lackadaisical attitude towards Krotalus—it’s just another blackened thrash tune, nothing special at all. As I listen to the whole of Blood Offerings, that’s a bit of a shame because the rest of the record is superior to that track. The three-part “Sea Of Vengeance” epic that closes the disc, the blistering “Evil Incarnate,” and the driving “Forest Of The Impaled” all stand out to these ears. There’s a tighter quality to these tunes—in place of the usual sloppy Teutonic-thrash-meets-pre-death-metal—and that control is coupled with a songwriting focus that the other tunes lack. Between the tightened riffing and the more inspired structure, songs like “Forest” have moments that, given an insanely high-pitched falsetto vocal instead of Bradley’s growl, wouldn’t be too far from 3 Inches Of Blood. (I know that’s a strange comparison, and one that is probably unique to me and could be considered offensive. Rest assured, I don’t intend it to be. I’ll admit that 3IOB is a band that I enjoy, taken for what they are, which is good but goofy.) Like that band, Krotalus seems aware of its second-hand nature—they’re clearly paying tribute to bands that they enjoy—and as tired as I’m growing of the “we can’t think of anything new so let’s just do what ruled back then” ideal, there’s an enthusiasm on display that’s hard to deny.
I’m not jumping up and down here, but I like this one a’ight. Yeah, it’s not the best record I’ve heard all year, but in five or six listens, I enjoyed it more than my jaded ears would let me at first. The trilogy at the end is really where I find myself digging this one most. These songs are more interesting than the rest, with their classic-styled riffing and their metal-as-hell titles: “The Dark Prophecy (Sea Of Vengeance I),” “Cloak Of Darkness (Sea Of Vengeance II),” and “Brink Of Destruction (Sea Of Vengeance III.)” Fans of the old-school will likely dig it, and it holds its own against Merciless Death or some other such Sodom-indebted new-thrash phenom. All in all, I’d say Krotalus has potential to make a solid second record if they can step a little further outside their influences while upping the songwriting dynamics a bit. This one’s slightly above average, but not awesome.