After reissuing the first four albums of KREATOR, which marked a high point in German Thrash Metal and rendered the band as a leader among the holy foursome, Noise Records returns with the next four albums that showcased KREATOR's career in the 90s decade and the effects of period on their music and way of thinking. "Coma Of Souls" was the band's first steps timeframe that changed Metal music forever, whether for better or for worse.

In KREATOR's case, and some of others, even when the tides begin to shift, it doesn't mean that it would end in calamity. The 80s decade, the golden age of Metal music, ended and with the start of the 90s various kind of influences slowly slithered under the sheets and started wreaking havoc. KREATOR post-"Extreme Aggression" underwent a lineup change that appeared to bear importance. The recruiting of ex-SODOM's Frank "Blackfire" Gosdzik resulted in another band member that actually writes and records, of course under the wing of the band's chieftain Mille Petrozza. Furthermore, and even though maturity has been a formative part of KREATOR's music even in their so-called raw years of the 80s, an ongoing change that I deem to have started in "Extreme Aggression", took a rather exemplary shape in their following cataclysmic social and environmental disorder, "Coma Of Souls".

Reading through the linear notes of the specially made booklet, portraying an interview with Petrozza and along with listening to the bonus live performance of the band in their country, made me better understand what has been going on. "Coma Of Souls", which I consider to be the band's top brand in the 90s, and it even, with a whole lot of might, challenges its predecessor. After showing their worth at covering RAVEN's "Lambs To The Slaughter", as part of the "Out Of The Dark... Into The Light" EP after "Pleasure To Kill", listening to KREATOR playing their fast paced Thrash assault with bits of British styled melodies, didn't hurt at all, it even enriched the experience. Within the veils of "Coma Of Souls", conceived also by label pressure to release another album, the melodic perception appeared to fit like a glove to the newly presented songs. Even Petrozza himself, as he barks the lyrics like a fiend, sounded clearer and cleaner, also thanks the band's ex-producer, Randy Burns.

The roughness and savage grace that loomed over the previous four albums was still there, kicking and screaming, but the new integration slowly created a different kind of monster. My favorite track and chosen, "Agents Of Brutality", and don't worry I also admire the likes of the usual hits of the album played live, proves that within the chaos, a form of light shed over the songwriting and musical approach. KREATOR also knew well how to slow down, producing heavy chugs of haunting, yet simplistic, rhythm that would spike motivation to grab a guitar and start jamming, actually it happened to me the first time I listened to "People Of The Lie", but I settled for an air guitar back in the day. The influential melodic beast "Terror Zone", horrific futuristic "When The Sun Burns Red" and the brutal disturbance of "Coma Of Souls" are nothing more than a work of art, a kind of development within Thrash Metal in general that placed it in a whole different level.

"Coma Of Souls", in a way is a subtle version of "Extreme Aggression". Checking the band's performance in Furth, might indicate enough elements to the notion stated. Even though it seemed that on some of the older songs the band lowered their pedal to the Metal a little, maybe to reserve force for the classic earlier tunes that needed physical energy to maintain, KREATOR wonderfully showed versions of themselves, a process that still goes on today as they paved themselves as one of the melodic Thrash Metal bands in the world.