SADUS – THE SHADOW INSIDE

(Andy Synn offers his humble thoughts on the first new Sadus album in seventeen years)

Some bands, as I’m sure you’re aware, are so seminal that fragments of their musical DNA still litter the genetic code of pretty much all their descendants, no matter how far removed.

For example, no matter how “extreme” or “avant-garde” or “genre non-conforming” you might be, there’s always going to be some Black Sabbath or Judas Priest or Motorhead in your music, in the same way that we all, deep-down, still have bits and pieces of our earliest ancestors swimming around in our primordial protoplasm.

But it’s not just the biggest and most notable (or notorious) names who leave their mark upon us. And chances are that if you’ve ever been a fan of the proggier side of Thrash or the more technical end of Death Metal then you’ve probably absorbed some Sadus into your system, even if you didn’t know it at the time.

And now, seventeen(!) years since we last heard from them – a time in which a whole generation of Metal fans may well have grown up having never even heard of them – Sadus have returned to retake their place in a Metal scene whose seeds they undoubtedly played at least some small part in sowing.

Given that it’s been, arguably, a good thirty years since Sadus were at their peak (with 1997’s Elements of Anger and 2006’s unfortunately rather unmemorable “comeback” album, Out For Blood, being far from their best work) you could be forgiven for approaching The Shadow Inside expecting a whiff of dated nostalgia to surround the material.

And while some might find guitarist/vocalist Darren Travis‘s strangulated snarl a little anachronistic when compared with many of the more prevalent modern vocal styles, the truth is that much of this album wouldn’t sound all that out of place (if at all) on a playlist alongside the likes of Havok, Revocation, or Cryptic Shift, and I doubt that a properly double-blinded listener would ever guess that, between the two of them, Travis and drummer Jon Allen have more than a century of Extreme Metal experience.

Sure, there’s no denying that Steve DiGorgio‘s stupendously slippery bass-lines are missed (none of the press materials indicate who actually handled bass on the album, but I’d hazard a guess it was Travis) and some of the songwriting does occasionally stray a little too far into self-indulgence (the intro to “First Blood” really did not need to be two minutes long, and the entirety of “New Beginnings” is utterly surplus to requirements) but, at its best, The Shadow Inside demonstrates that these two old dogs have lost none of their bite.

It’s also a testament to the duo’s confidence in their own abilities that they haven’t felt the need to learn any new tricks in an attempt to “modernise” their sound – don’t expect to hear any token blastbeat sections or ill-advised “breakdowns”, especially when Allen’s rapid-fire drum-work makes the former largely unnecessary, while the crisp but rugged production of Juan Urteaga gives the music more than enough punch without them needing to resort to such desperate measures – and have, instead, simply stuck to their guns, trusting that they can still hit their target even after all this time.

It’s a bold move, sure, but one which pays off big-time, especially during the album’s first half, where the chunky riffs and pounding kick-patterns of “Scorched and Burnt”, the hefty hooks and clever technical twists of “It’s the Sickness”, and the red-line intensity of “Ride the Knife” quickly prove, in swift succession, that the perilous pair have lost none of their vim and vigour.

If anything, it sometimes feels like the duo’s partnership is even more in sync than ever – take a listen to any of the songs mentioned above, then check out the vicious velocity of “Anarchy” and the irresistibly crunchy grooves of “The Devil In Me”, and you’ll get the undeniable sense that they’re not just playing with one another, but they’re playing off each other, letting the drums enhance the riffs, and vice versa, in a clever creative feedback loop – suggesting that, even after such a long period of silence, some creative bonds just can’t be broken.

And although there’s no question that The Shadow Inside is rather front-loaded (with the climactic title-track being the exception which proves this particular rule) it’s still one heck of a statement from a band who, on the evidence presented here, still haven’t quite finished writing their legacy!