Boarders - The World Hates Me
Quam Libet Records

file under heavy / power metal

Sjak: The Italian heavy metal/thrash metal band Boarders is totally unknown to me but they seem to be in existence already from the year 1989 onwards. They started as a Megadeth tribute band during their first couple of years but they gradually evolved to writing their own material (which obviously still has quite some Megadeth influences). Furthermore, judging from their lyrics, they seem to be influenced quite a lot by the big man above, but this is certainly nowhere really disturbing.

I’m quite pleased that vocalist Egi absolutely doesn’t have an irritating Italian accent and that he possesses a fairly powerful and varied voice. Not really a commonality with Italian bands! The band plays an uncomplicated mix of eighties metal and thrash and on average this sounds quite okay.

Opening track ‘True Rebellion’ is a straightforward guitar rocker with a nice beat and good vocals. The following ‘Baptized By Fire’ sounds totally different and quite obviously shows the adoration for Megadeth. The eighties thrash influences are also heard during ‘Schmertzgarten’, a song which is all about the holocaust. Other songs worth mentioning are the ballad ‘Never Alone’, the inevitable Megadeth cover ‘In My Darkest Hour’ (quite a good version by the way) and closing track ‘The World Hates Me’, a for the biggest part instrumental track based on a Black Sabbath-alike riff with some narrative parts from the books of Luke and John. According to me they could have done something more with this last track because the riffs used are among the best of the album and because of the instrumental character the song tends to become a little bit boring after a while.

Despite of this the overall impression of this album is a fairly positive one and the people who like a decent mix of thrash and eighties metal should definitely give this a try if the opportunity arises.

Rating: 71/100 (details)

http://www.boarders.it