As far as I know, this might have been the first VENOM Tribute ever released. At this time, while many peoples didn't gave a fuck about this band anymore (Probably because too much of average albums, regional assaults, re-releases from no-need-land...), Abaddon decided to create this project and motivate quite "acclaimed" metal bands of the time to honor one of their strong influences and teenage object of worship... It could have been a good idea, yum, but something was strange and kinda wasted my pleasure: You couldn’t find a real incarnation of every listed bands, since Abaddon generally played the drums (And he has never been the best drummer... It could have been better to let other peoples do what they feel, and possibly offer new ideas), plus few musicians from the listed bands did their thing, and finally some 'illustrious unknown' filled the holes of this studio project... (Yes, studio project :-/)Does it really sound so much as a tribute anymore? Doesn't it sound strange to hear a drummer paying homage to his own music on a tribute album?
Questions could flow, and re-flow... And that's kinda old blabber, isn't it? So we'll simply talk about the music, since it's what matters the most :-)
-First of all, you had KREATOR (Or better said Mille?) making "Witching hour" more thrashy, faster, and displaying the frenetic vocals of Mille Petrozza. A quite good cover, that showed some energy. Some might say “Grrrr”.
-Then, ANATHEMA did a cool version of "Welcome to hell". It kept somekind of the initial obscure mood (If I could say so), with a quite moody production and low-pitched vocals distorted through an obscure chorus. Not bad at all, and quite groovy... I wished ANATHEMA followed much more this kind of vibes, because most of their own stuffs only disappointed my imagination...
-Then, VOIVOD turned "In league with satan" in their own way. It definitely sounded like VOIVOD, with high-pitched & quite "visionary" vocals, a sci-fi aspect, and other cool stuffs... I didn't like it much at the time, because I was young and the vocals seemed strange, but they did a nice job. Cool.
-Then some guys of NUCLEAR ASSAULT, and other peoples (From the studio?), tried to cover "Die hard"... But it wasn't that good (Huh!). I have never been a fan of this particular song, and the quite Us heavy metallish vocals didn't do it (Urk)... A quite boring cover!
-Where there ever some SKYCLAD fans in the assembly? Well, their first album was cool, but what about the following? This time they turned "Prime evil" in their own middle-age world... Ok, they kinda changed the song, with violins and few other goblins, but I never found it good. Blah!
-SODOM surprisingly choose to cover "1000 days in Sodom" (What a clever choice! Ah! I guess VENOM might even have been the origin of their moniker) and did an ok but just average job... It sounds like the average heavy moments of SODOM era 93-95 (Tapping the vein), and I never liked it much... (SODOM = Fast as fuck! In your ass baby!!)
-Then, various peoples covered "Countess bathory" under the CANDLEMASS moniker, and there's not much to say... This was just an average one, while the original was better.
-After all of this, it could have been better, but it's not really... PARADISE LOST did a quite boring cover of "In nomine sathanas" that sounded like the heaviest of their "Shades of god" album, minus the sorrow... And blah! You get bored.
-Then came the little surprise: Two new songs of VENOM that probably disappointed some die-hards: It was a time when the guys were experimenting with Indus metal. Even if these two songs weren't mind-blowing, I kinda like the atmosphere and the kinda "Easy listening" indus metal à la old NIN or FILTER... It might have been a cool idea for VENOM to do more of these experiments and release it under another moniker (What about turning the letters inside out? You get MONEV? Just an effort, and it turns to MONEY!? Some kind of prophecy? Ah Ah)
Finally, what you got was an average tribute album that contained a lot of average recordings, and it rather tasted like a compilation of various (Discutably useful) things than a real tribute.... Nothing vital, even for big fans... I still use to like it for "Nostalgic reasons", but that's all... Hopefully KREATOR, ANATHEMA and VOIVOD did it right and offered coolified covers. (And the artwork was cool).
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