Although RAZOR OF OCCAM's base is in England, the origin of the band comes from Australia and, in specific, Adelaide. This means that inside their blackened thrashing tunes you will find a lot of the aggression and lunacy that - traditionally - all the bands from over there carry.
They started around 1998 with the release of a demo named Diabologue that included three killer songs and especially the Occam's Razor one that more or less showed a band with future hopes. That tape became in the following year a 7 single via Damnation Records and four years later Circle Of Tyrants released one EP named Pillars Of Creation that was also good enough.
Time flies fast and - at last - their debut will be out this year under a big label name, Metal Blade, with the band as I mentioned before being in England. Unfortunately, although I was one of the few that were impressed by that demo, I feel a little bit disappointed by Homage To Martyrs. Despite the fact that they have a good production and sound, most of their songs seem not to be complete, without having a purpose or a direction. RAZOR OF OCCAM are revolved around the DESTRUCTION kind of riffing but are not inspired and become tiring and in the end nothing special will remain. Some songs, for example Heat Of Battle, are moving in total indifferently realms and their 30-minute CD becomes kinda boring.
Their influences, except the Germans above, have a clear ABSU element with some AGATUS/ZEMIAL things (check the first riff of Altar Of Corruption) or the heaviness of DESTROYER 666; two members here are also in them. But, the quality of the names that are their influences do not give the wanted results. The only good things that you will find are some cool guitars in Pattern On The Stone, well placed solos with an essential presence inside the songs and some very good drumming.
Maybe my expectations raised by their previous releases but what was left from Homage To Martyrs is it could have been much better. The lyrical approach, dealing with the battle between science and religion, especially in the Middle Ages, gives some bonus and I really hope for a more solid successor.