Italian thrashers Planar Evil's full-length debut is a disc of two halves, not in terms of quality, but of content. The first Intro and subsequent five songs are all brand new to this disc, written and recorded in 2008. The second Intro ushers in 2008 re-recordings of five tracks from their 2002 demo Land of Doom. This distinction in the age of the material has absolutely no effect on the flow of the album at all. All recorded at the same time the sound and recording quality is the same, and the their song writing was clearly as good at the beginning as it is now. Their sound is one part Anthrax and one part Kreator, mixing the slightly punkier edge of the former with the vicious thrash of the latter, in a similar way to current bands like Municipal Waste, but heavier. And with less attention given to puerile lyrics about drinking and partying too, thankfully. They are also able to vary the riffs and the melodies such that the disc doesn't run with the same double-bass drum beat and full-tilt guitars from start to finish. In the same way as the best Kreator and Destruction albums the sharp riffs are contrasted with heavier, chunky ones to cover the full spectrum of thrash, never getting boring, and there are some superb twin-lead breaks (check out the outro to Welcome To Transylvania) to break things up further. Easily one of the best thrash records of the year.