Enforced - War Remains - Metal Epidemic

Enforced – War Remains
Release Date: 28th April 2023
Label: Century Media
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Genre: Thrash, Crossover Thrash.
FFO: Slayer, Power Trip, High Command, Lowest Creature, Fugitive.
Review By: Mark Young

Well, well, well. Just when you thought that everything had to be over the top, technical and sometimes devoid of life, along comes a band that uses triplets as a means to commit GBH. Enforced are not hanging around here and taking a leaf from Slayer’s book of quick songs, they blast into Aggressive menace with some of the finest triplets committed to tape. This is unashamedly old-school, top-class thrash. Written and performed by people who clearly love it.

The Quickening (which thankfully doesn’t share anything with Highlander 2) is more of the same. I realise that this may sound like I am doing them a disservice, but nothing could be further from my mind. It just beats its way from a standing start and employs some abuse of the whammy bar that I’ve not heard in ages. This is a dangerous album to drive to.

And they don’t stop – Hanged by my Hand just rages, full of fury and anger and has THAT Lombardo cymbal tap. Then they throw some Slayer harmony parts in, and I start to smile. And then the start to Avarice – down picking heaven! War Remains is furious, and it just continues all the way through to the end. The final three – Ultra-violence, Starve and Empire bring the curtain down with the same furious intent shown on Aggressive Menace. There are no ballads here. No calling anyone ‘Baby’.

I love this album, because it absolutely 100% slays, just by being themselves. A possible criticism is that you could say it is one dimensional in attack, but this ties in directly with the band and their approach. Here, the aim is to batter you over the head and not fall foul of overthinking what they wanted to create.

When someone describes a release as a ‘raw’ I have a certain sound in mind and Enforced have done this. This is raw, it’s fast, nasty, and probably is the closest to capturing what they sound like in the live realm which is just fantastic. It shows how unafraid they are to just press record and go for it.

Something else with this, is that it makes me want to learn their songs because there is a visceral thrill with playing fast, angry music like this. It is uncomplicated, but don’t let that fool you into thinking that there is nothing of note here just because they aren’t playing complex chord shapes whilst stood on one leg.