The reason I requested to review EVIL INVADERS album "Shattering Reflection" is due to the many positive reactions they got in my immediate surroundings. Plus, I had seen these guys live and thoroughly enjoyed their youthful exuberance and enthusiasm the were portraying while performing live. So, I took it upon myself to request to be able to review this one from our main editor. And I am very glad that he has appointed me this, as I have to conclude that EVIL INVADERS have released quite a good album with "Shattering Reflection".

These Belgians hail from Leopoldsbrug, in Limburg and have been around for some 15 years now. So, to call them a new band might go a little far, but a fresh one is much more accurate. The Thrash Metal they play is anything but boring, it is definitely multi-layered and as diverse as possible. I mean, how many Thrash bands can boast that they have written and recorded a song that wouldn't go amiss ion a QUEENSRŸCHE album. Well, in this case, just listen to "In Deepest Black" and convince me that this couldn't have been on the "Rage For Order" album. I bet you can't. and before you ask, yes, this song does fit in with all the others on the album, as EVIL INVADERS don't just stick to one kind of Thrash Metal.

Sometimes they're fast and furious ("Sledgehammer Justice"), sometimes rather direct ("Die For Me"), at times at bit melancholic ("Forgotten Memories"), while they also know how be bombastic, or should that be dramatic? "Eternal Darkness" is both of those, but also a proper Thrasher. So you see, these guys have a whole range of styles and emotions to choose from and somehow have the ability to make the right choice time after time.

As to the rating of "Shattering Reflection", I do have to admit that although this is really, really good, almost outstanding, it still lacks just that little bit of unqualifiable extra that would make me classify this as a future classic, or an unmissable one. I feel EVIL INVADERS have given us enough good music to make "Shattering Reflection" into one to keep an eye on, one that needs to be heard by all Thrash Metal fans around the world, not just in our beloved Benelux. And who knows, maybe in time I will be forced to acknowledge that I am wrong here, and that EVIL INVADERS have surpassed themselves and all expectations on "Shattering Reflection". In this case I wouldn't mind to be corrected.