Curran Murphy, go-to second axeman for Nevermore and Annihilator, has assembled a pretty good crack squad for his own band, Shatter Messiah. There’s a lot of talent and experience on display here. Their debut album, ‘Never to Play the Servant’ was pretty well-received, and ‘God Burns Like Flesh’ isn’t bad – it’s just not that great.

The music is ballsy but tuneful, primarily modern thrash with a lot of melody and drama, much like Nevermore or Communic. The playing is tight, the vocals are powerful and the music is of a very professional quality. What’s missing are the layered details and adventurous yet assured ideas that raised releases in a similar vein by  Communic and even  Scariot to such stellar levels, earlier this year. Songs like the hidden track, ‘Stripped Of Faith’, ‘This Is The Day’ or ‘Buried In Black’ all have good shifts, effective melodies, great solos and crushing yet intelligently composed riffs. But it feels as if each idea could have been polished or twisted a little more. Far too many songs simply occupy the space of being good songs on a middling album without really breaking out of the mould. ‘Idolater’, ‘Dirge Of  The Christ’ and ‘Tommorow Immortal’ are all very promising songs, but they do no more than they need to, and don’t stretch out for the unexpected suckerpunch. There are far too many times when there’s a bar of essentially dead space as a progression or a riff completes itself, and I can’t help but think how tighter construction and more ideas could have made that doldrum into a quickie tsunami with a kickass fill or mini-interlude.

What Shatter Messiah have done here isn’t necessarily disastrous – there are great albums, and then there are good albums, and then there are so-so albums that don’t make your jaw drop in awe, but aren’t bad at all, either. That’s the sort of album this is. Maybe I’m just spoiled, but the fact is that the bar has been raised pretty high in this genre. Shatter Messiah have the chops and the aggression down – and they definitely deserve points for that – but they have to push harder to make a bigger impact.

Year of Release: 2007
Label: Dockyard 1