I'm keeping close to home this time. PROJECT PAIN is a Dutch Thrash Metal band from Amersfoort, some 80 kilometres from my own home. So just a stone's throw away. "Faster Disaster" is actually their fourth full length album in 10 years. The first thing that amazes me is that the Hardcore/Punk influenced opener "Val Kapot", which means Drop Dead, is thrown at us in the Dutch language. It is a complaint against all those people that will be nice in your face but stab you in the back as soon as you turn around. Brilliantly done.

The rest of the album is all sung in the English language. The second song "Mean Metal Machine" starts with "Fuck Off Bitch", so again, you know that the friendliness isn't to be found at first glance. Musically we are now entering the pure Thrash Metal atmosphere. From now on it's all fast and furious, with some very short and aggressive riffing, drumming and singing. And of course you'll hear the influences of the late eighties and early nineties flying past you left, right and centre.

Usually that is something to rejoice about, as it means that the band haven't held back, and I can assure you that PROJECT PAIN definitely haven't done that. No, they have conspired to treat us to a slab of very much in your face Thrash Metal, a feat they have easily succeeded in. you will not able to sit still, or stand still. You will want to move around like the maniac you are. But there is something that is preventing me from giving this full marks.

The thing that springs to mind during all of this is that "Faster Disaster" might sound original at first, but you will hear all kinds of cliches, vocal lines, sentences and musical pieces pass you by that have been used before. well, if you are a Thrash metal nut you won't mind one bit, because this is hitting all the right notes and taking you on a proper Thrashing tour. I don't mind some older parts being used, but I am just hearing too many of them during my listening of "Faster Disaster". It just is becoming a tad too obvious, and that is starting to annoy me. Not something I like to feel when listening to music. I really feel PROJECT PAIN  could have done with more originality, more unique ideas.