The Album by Album Challenge: Anthrax

anthrax_wallpaperWelcome to another “Album by Album Challenge.” For those that are new here, the “Album by Album Challenge” is where I take a band’s entire discography and listen to every album in order of release from front to back. With my unforgiving and well-aged ear, I call it how I hear it. In some cases, I find that what I once thought was good is actually pretty crappy and sometimes crap manages to age into something pretty kick ass. And in some cases, face melting is still just good ol’ face melting.

This time around I found myself visiting the Anthrax discography. I’ve been an Anthrax fan for nearly 25 years but after the band ousted singer Joey Belladonna for former Armored Saint singer John Bush I just kind of lost interest. To celebrate the return of Joey Belladonna and Anthrax’s recent, and triumphant, headlining run on the Metal Alliance tour, I decided to make this my latest Album by Album Challenge. I’d love to hear everyone’s comments on this as because these are just my opinions and you know what they say…

Fistful of Metal
Release Date: January, 1984
The Good: Deathrider, Metal Thrashing Mad, I’m Eighteen, Panic, Subjugator, Soldiers of Metal, Death From Above, Anthrax, Across the River, Howling Furies
The Bad:
The Indifferent:

So I can totally see how Anthrax fans would not like this album so much but goddamn do I love this album. Fistful of Metal is totally appropriate for the time that it came out. It is so over the top and singer Neil Turbin lets loose some of the most facemelting, “LOL” causing screams. Listening to this album reminded me just how much fun listening to thrash metal in the 80’s was. It’s almost as if every thrash band’s debut album just took things so over the top that it was so ridiculously awesome. Just compare this one to Metallica’s “Kill ‘Em All” or Megadeth’s “Killing is My Business…” The one thing I can hear in this album is that I can hear more influence on some of today’s bands more so than the other Anthrax albums. This album totally reminds me of Holy Grail and one can only imagine just how much Neil Turbin Holy Grail singer James Paul Luna has ingrained in his little metal cranium. While it’s not Anthrax’s greatest piece, it’s a legendary piece of metal that helped to form and shape a genre. It’s a fun listen and I have no issues whatsoever with it. There isn’t a bad song on this album and every one is as ridiculous and over the top as the other which at times has you holding that mighty invisible apple. If anything, I really appreciate Turbin’s over the top qualities but as we all know, sometimes to achieve greatness you have to make changes.

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Spreading the Disease
Release Date: October 30, 1985
The Good: A.I.R, Lone Justice, Madhouse, Stand or Fall, The Enemy, Gung Ho
The Bad:
The Indifferent: Aftershock, Medusa

The first album to feature Joey Belladonna on vocals and Frankie Bello on bass. This is where the classic Anthrax lineup would be born. This is also the first Anthrax album where the “classic” songs like “A.I.R”, “Madhouse”, and “Medusa” that would make the band’s repertoire were born. Belladonna’s vocals on this album are so fucking good and I can totally see just why they went with this guy. While Turbin totally had the range, you can hear a total change in the lyrical content after Belladonna joined. How much he had to do with this I’m not sure as all the songs are credited to “Anthrax” but I can totally hear a significant growth in not just the writing but the over all performances. The band was playing with a lot more feel and groove as opposed to breakneck speed and ridiculousness. The tempo changes, the complex but accessible song structures, and groove laden crunch riffs are the things that I’ve come to associate with Anthrax and here we get to hear just where that sound was born. After listening to this album I’m also aware of some amazing songs that get sadly ignored these days. “Stand or Fall” and “The Enemy” are every bit as classic as “AIR” and “Medusa” and I’d love to hear those pulled out from time to time. “Medusa” just kind of bored me and “Aftershock” annoyed with that annoying, horrible chant of “SHOCK! SHOCK! SHOCK!” That shit had me chanting “STOP! STOP! STOP!” All in all, this is a great album. Only a couple of duds on this one and even those weren’t horrible. This was a great start for this now classic lineup.

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Among The Living
Release Date: March 22, 1987
The Good: Among the Living, Caught in a Mosh, I Am the Law, Efilnikufesin (NFL), Skeletons in the Closet, Indians, One World, A.D.I The Horror of it All, Imitation of Life
The Bad:
The Indifferent:

I forget just how important this band is sometimes and when I hear shit like this I’m reminded of that fact. Among The Living is an album that deserves as much praise as any other great album. After seeing Anthrax recently performing this album on the Metal Alliance tour, I re-visited this album with a whole new appreciation. This album also spawned most of the band’s most popular songs and it doesn’t’ take a genius to see why this album is so popular. It’s a very easy listen and it’s also one of those albums that I feel was very strategically sequenced. There’s a great flow to this album and from start to finish it’s a really fun listen. Among the Living also feels like the band really found their groove with Joey Belladonna. On Spreading the Disease, I felt like Belladonna might have even been trying to be a little like Neil Turbin vocally whereas on ATL he totally found his own voice and delivery which would have him becoming an iconic metal singer in his own right. All in all, there isn’t a bad song on this album. It’s every bit as iconic as it’s made out to be and is totally worth of any and all praise it gets for being a timeless, classic metal album.

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State of Euphoria
Release Date: September 19, 1988
The Good: Be All End All, Out of Sight Out of Mind, Make Me Laugh, Antisocial, Who Cares Wins, Schism, Misery Loves Company, Finale
The Bad:
The Indifferent: 13

I remember liking this album a lot when it was first released in 1988 but for some reason I don’t remember it making a huge impression on me. Listening to this album 25 years later has me sitting here with my fucking jaw on the floor. Holy fuck what a monstrous album. You want to talk about some serious, significant growth both lyrically and musically? Then listen to this album. “Be All End All” is so fucking amazing and slamming right into “Out of Sight, Out of Mind” completely crushed my face. Joey Belladonna at this point has shaped himself into an unstoppable force. His voice is so fucking strong and powerful and the musical arrangements are mature yet still lots of fun. Even as played out as “Antisocial” can be, it’s still a fun listen and I really don’t ever get tired of hearing it. This album also has a lot of great songs that are sadly ignored these days. Songs like “Now It’ Dark”, “Schism”, and “Misery Loves Company” are such amazing songs. I would love to see Anthrax do a tour someday where all they play are these long, lost, and forgotten songs that are every bit as amazing if not more so than the ones that they play every fucking tour. Rediscovering State of Euphoria was a really awesome surprise for me. It’s an amazing album that while it didn’t connect with me as much back in ‘88 has completely connected with me and made me fan 25 years later. This just may be my new favorite Anthrax album but will it measure up as we move forward? Let’s find out.

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Persistence of Time
Release Date: August 21, 1990
The Good: Time, Blood, Keep It In the Family, in My World, Gridlock, Intro to Reality, Belly of the Beast, One Man Stands,
The Bad:
The Indifferent: Got The Time, H8 Red,

Coming off the heels of State of Euphoria, Anthrax followed up with an album that dark, brooding, and even progressive sounding at times. Where State of Euphoria was a fun and accessible album, Persistence of Time is an album you really have to “listen” to. For this one, Anthrax cashed in their cartoonish and at times silly lyrics for lyrics that touched on some serious social and political consciousness. Even as a sophomore in highschool I was totally aware that this was a pretty dark fucking record and I loved it. I put this album up there with Metallica’s Master of Puppets and Megadeth’s Rust In Peace as this is Anthrax at their creative best. While I would personally say that this is their best album, I wouldn’t say that it’s my favorite. Songs like “Time”, “Blood”, and even “Keep it in the Family” have the accessibility that can appeal to the casual fans but songs like “Belly of the Beast” and even “In My World” are pretty dark songs. I can remember at one time feeling that this was my favorite Anthrax album but as I said before, while I find it to be their best creative work up to this point, it’s not really my favorite. Persistence of Time is a really dark, moody album and maybe it’s just that up to this point Anthrax was this fun, cut loose kind of thrash band. The only points of this album that I didn’t really love was “H8 Red” and “Got the Time.” As for “Got the Time”, I didn’t like it when it was released as a single back in 1990 and even now it just sounds kind of dumb. I wish they would pull it from their live shows and give us another gem from this album like the title track or “Belly of the Beast.”

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Sound of White Noise
Release Date: May 25, 1993
The Good: Potter’s Field, Only, Invisible, Burst, This is Not an Exit
The Bad: Packaged Rebellion, Black Lodge, C11H17N2O2S Na,
The Indifferent: Room For One More, Hy Pro Glo, 1,000 Points of Light,

Wow. Listening to this album now finds me liking it even less than I did when it first came out. Being a huge ‘thrax fan, I bought this album when it came out and went to a show on this tour and was horribly let down. I felt like the band was literally selling out and in my opinion, this album just proves it. Anthrax was desperately trying to gains some sort of modern relevence and commercial success. Instead of being the thrash legends that they were, they wanted to have hit songs and videos. They canned Joey Belladonna by phone (had their managers do it for them) and they got former Armored Saint singer John Bush. I was a huge Armored Saint fan so I was assuming this would be a monstrous album. Instead, it’s an album that sounds like a thrash band trying to be an alternative, grunge band. “Black Lodge” is very Alice In Chains sounding where “Packaged Rebellion” is as cheesy as you can get. It’s a totally corny song that comes across as trying to be a really serious song. Lots of fail right there. The album has about 3 or 4 good songs and even those songs are just “good” and nothing more. For the most part, this album is totally unlistenable for me. It’s painful to hear them trying so hard to be something that they’re not. This is where I stopped listening to Anthrax completely until Belladonna’s triumphant return for Worship Music. I’m really scared for what lies ahead for me with these other John Bush albums.

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Stomp 442
Release Date: October 24, 1995
The Good:
The Bad: Random Acts of Senseless Violence, Fueled, King Sized, Riding Shotgun, Perpetual Motion, In A Zone, Nothing, Drop the Ball, Tester, Bare
The Indifferent:

The album art for this album is a giant ball of thrash.  This is without a doubt a hint of what lies inside.  What the hell is this crap? Man, I thought Sound of White Noise was bad. This is a fucking atrocious album. How can one band make so much shitty music? “Riding Shotgun”? Really? I wish John Bush would take his own advice and “suck it suck it suck it.” It’s so sad that THIS is the music we got out of this union. Being such a big Armored Saint fan, it’s just sickening to me to hear such crappy music and crappy vocal delivery from Bush and Co. “In A Zone” literally had me wanting to punch my computer while yelling, “SHUT THE FUCK UP JOHN! I DON’T CARE IF YOU’RE IN A ZONE…” “American Pompeii”. What the fuck is that? I can’t even talk any more about this album. I just get more and more pissed the more I think about it. There isn’t one single redeeming quality to this album. None. Act like it never happened.

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Volume 8: The Threat is Real
Release Date: July 21, 1998
The Good:
The Bad: Toast to the Extras, Killing Box, Big Fat, Cupajoe, Alpha Male,
The Indifferent: Crush, Catharsis, Inside Out, P&V, Born Again Idiot, Harm’s Way, Hog Tied, Stealing From a Theif

“The Threat is Real” alright. The threat of having to sit through another shitty Bushtrax album is VERY real. Once again, I’m just not sure what Anthrax was going for on this album. While most of the songs aren’t nearly as bad as the songs on Stomp 442, they are still mediocre at best. The first song that had me making a shit face was “Toast to the Extras.” Was this Anthrax’s attempt to get back to being “silly”? It’s a fucking country song and it sucks beyond any level of suckiness I can imagine. “Cupajoe” was supposed to be “funny” but on an album full of seriously shitty songs, the humor was totally missed here and it just added fuel to the fire. Volume 8 is not as flat out horrible as Stomp 442 but it’s still a pretty shitty record. Volume 8 sounds like Anthrax’s desperate attempt to try and modernize their sound. I totally hear elements of Pantera in here which I fucking hated hearing. Why would you try and sound like a band that you influenced? The fact that they just couldn’t stick to their guns and just be themselves is painfully obvious with every Bush era album they released.

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We’ve Come for You All
Release Date: May 6, 2003
The Good: What Doesn’t Die,
The Bad: Safe Home, Cadillac Rock Box, Think About an End, W.C.F.Y.A,
The Indifferent: Superhero, Refuse to Be Denied, Any Place but Here, Taking the Music Back,

Wow. This album couldn’t be over any sooner. This one was so fucking bad I literally had to take a break 1/2 way through it, get a snack, clean my office a little bit, and then listen to another album just to clear my head. I cannot even wrap my head around just how horrible these songs are. The album actually started off promising with “What Doesn’t Die” but then somewhere along the line it just took a nose dive into the Shitlantic Ocean. “Ooo, Diamond Darrell plays on this album.” Big fucking deal. Hell, one of the songs he plays on is one of three songs that sound like fucking NICKELBACK. Yes, you heard me right… FUCKING NICKELBACK! Jesus H. Chizzist, I felt the anger in me brewing up just having to remember that shit. I sure am glad I did this challenge because now I know I have ZERO reasons to ever go back and re-listen to anything that John Bush sang on period. Thank god this chapter is over and done with. I need a drink now.

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Worship Music
Release Date: September 12, 2011
The Good: Earth on Hell, The Devil You Know, Fight ‘Em Till You Can’t, I’m Alive, In The End, The Giant, Judas Priest, Crawl, The Constant, Revolution Screams
The Bad:
The Indifferent:

Holy fucking thrash Batman! ANTHRAX IS BACK! So while I know that this album was written before they even decided to get Joey Belladonna back in the band, I can’t help but hear and feel the power of his presence and influence on this album. Everything about this album is what I loved about Anthrax from the get go. This album very well could have been the follow up to Persistence of Time. I feel like Worship Music is a perfect mix of the accessibility of State of Euphoria and the serious and at times social/political consciousness of Persistence of Time. There is a very damn good reason why this album got all of fan and critical acclaim that it got. Just fucking listen to it. Just in the first three songs I can hear and feel that hunger, anger, and perseverance of a band that just decided it was tired of going with the grain for so many years. “In the End” just may be one of Anthrax’s greatest songs. This very fitting tribute to the late, great Ronnie James Dio has become a staple of their live performances and it’s a moving and intense tribute to say the least. I cannot even begin to praise this album any more than I already have. There isn’t one fucking song on this album that you could skip past. Every song is as good if not better than the one before it. Worship Music has a flow to it that creates a really awesome listening experience. This is not an album by a tired band or a band that is tapping out. As far as I’m concerned, this is a new beginning for Anthrax and I cannot wait to see just where they go from here.

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