The Haunted

Made Me Do It (Earache)
by Scott Hefflon

Ya gotta love it… Earache finally steps back up to the plate as a metal force to contend with, and they introduce themselves with two powerhouse bands, The Haunted and Morbid Angel. The Haunted Made Me Do It explores the serial killer angle, and with riffsters like these guys (Witchery, ex-At The Gates, if ya somehow missed the fawning over their eponymous release of ’98), ya know yer in for a shredding good time. New vocalist Marco Aro brings a harder, more direct growl to the sound – if Peter Dolving (ex-Mary Beats Jane, whose one Metallica-sounding Geffen release I quite liked) sounded too much like Pantera’s Phil Anselmo, Aro digs deeper and leaves the “singing” to others.

Many applauded The Haunted members for leaving At The Gates, just as the genre they’d practically developed really began to take off, in order to play what they really wanted: Classic thrash. Critics and fans will again applaud as The Haunted show the kids how it’s done. Brutal, crushing, manic riffs lobbed about like handfulls of mashed potatoes in a food fight, The Haunted are here to make a bloody mess and get the hell out before the janitor can gauge the devastation. Guitarists will be humbled, vocalists will think about keeping their day jobs just a little longer, and fans may finally realize, “Wow, compared to this, the nü metal stuff I listen to sounds really simple, worse than my 12-year-old brother’s shitty band, and I’ve bought into it for too long! Thank you, The Haunted, for making me realize there are more than a couple chords that can be grunted out on the guitar.” Yeah, I wish… Other perks here are “mosh” parts (look it up, kids) contrasting the great shredding thrash mania, and the new “underwater” style chorus on a few songs. Offsets the overpowering roar quite nicely.
(43 West 38th St. New York, NY 10018)