Live Review : Death Angel + Thrown Into Exile + Reaper @ Rebellion, Manchester on August 15th 2022

If Uada provided a stiff Aperitif for Bloodstock, then Death Angel is the perfect lengthy digestif. And I put the emphasis on lengthy, as even though the UK dates are right in the middle of a continental festival trek, Death Angel resist the temptation to just give us their mid-afternoon set and instead serve up a whopping two-hour plus show. We even get a decent undercard with much fancied Liverpudlian thrashers Reaper opening up proceedings. There is something wonderfully endearing about watching a bunch of kids, who weren't even around when thrash first happened (hell, whose parents probably won't even around) play this music with such conviction and obvious enjoyment. 

The point here is that Reaper have realised that thrash is all about fun. It stuck its two fingers up at metal’s more Poe-faced genres and revelled in its own absurdity and stupidity. It's that rampant ecstaticism that Reaper perfectly captured. They revel in the joy of playing music, and that core happiness is utterly infectious. They may make a host of fuck-ups, but thrash was never about perfection. It embraced punk’s DIY aesthetic and warts and all mentality, and it is that feeling of watching a bunch of kids dicking around having the time of their lives that makes Reaper such a joy to behold.

My main problem with Thrown Into Exile is that I had seen Lamb of God the previous night. Usually, I would find their competent groove metal, pleasant and maybe even endearing. But when you witnessed the masters and the architects of that type of metal not twenty-four hours beforehand up, the sheen is well and truly taken off. They are not bad, and they manage to candour quite an impressive response from the heaving crowd shoehorned into rebellion, but, for me, there is just not enough originality at play here for them to come across as anything but a pound shop imitation.

The crowd consists of two distinct tribes. On the one hand, there are the 50-year-olds in their fading vintage T-shirts from a bygone age. On the other, there are twentysomething whippersnappers for whom Death Angel are a cherished heritage act. What is wonderful is seeing these two groups merge in mutual adulation for the band. You see Death Angel are probably the most underrated of thrash’s pioneers. They even struggle to be seen as part of the "next" big four (Testament, Exodus, Overkill, Nuclear Assault). However, the influence and shadow that they cast is immense. For me, "Frolic in the Park" is the seminal thrash work. A masterclass in frenetic rifferie and strident song structures. It blew my 16-year-old mind when I first heard it and resulted in me stepping beyond the shallow waters of Metallica and Anthrax. 

Tonight feels like Bill and Ted have shown up in their Time Machine and whisked us back to thrash’s heyday. There is an air of a mid-80s show before thrash made an ill-gotten attempt to go mainstream. There is no barrier and there is no security, but there is never a feeling of danger, just pure and utter admiration and adoration. The bodies fly and the pit swirls, but never does it feel malicious or perilous, just utterly joyous. Mark Osegueda keeps referring back to the pandemic and you can tell this is a band that is thrilled to be able to be back doing what they do best. The audience may well spend the entire set in euphoric rapture but then again so does Death Angel. They are as happy and elated to be here as we are. It is that mutual delight and jubilance that makes two hours fly by. It is an epic set peppered with much interaction from Mark, but never does it sag and never does it feel unnecessarily elongated.

What is interesting is how the latter-day material is treated with the same level of reverence and rapture as the stuff from their seminal first three albums. In fact, we get more material from “the Dream Calls for Blood” and “the Art of Dying” than we do from either the aforementioned “Frolic Through the Park” or “Act III”. My only gripe for the whole evening is the fact that from the former we get the solitary ‘Bored’. But in many ways, I'm clutching at straws to find things to moan about this evening as it is probably about as close to perfection as you going to get. It is that perfect union of in-form band and worshipful audience.

Mark is in a chatty and irreverent mood, and we get an extended section where they jam Priest and Maiden numbers whilst he reminisces about past trips to the UK and the fact that thrash has morphed from a fad to a lifestyle. What could have slowed the night down instead further breaks down the fourth wall between act and audience. Music is a unifying bond and tonight this couldn't be truer. 

It is well past curfew when ‘Thrown to the Wolves’ finally brings things to a shuddering halt, but nobody wants to go home and the band spend another good 10 minutes shaking hands and interacting with their audience. You say the key thing about Death Angel is that they belong to their fans. They may never make the heights of the big four or even eight but frankly, we don't care. They care about us and we care about them and that connection is something really special and what makes nights like this so so wondrous.