helterskelter.ca

RAZOR
1988 - Violent Restitution.
1990 - Shotgun Jusctice.
way more Helter Skelter.

March 30, 1988 - 2023: 35 years of: Violent Restitution.

The saw is family !

In this sixth installment of hate, coming back strong from 1987's lukewarm Custom Killing LP, this time, the machine is fueled with actual petrol and the blood is dripping aplenty. No more razors, this is: The Canadian Chainsaw Massacre !

A soiled canvas with body-parts, this sick intro brings us "The Marshall Arts", right into the nuclear assault of "Hypertension". The saw roars on the mosh-pit destroyer "Taste The Floor" and the speedmetal of "Violent Restitution" ...you ain't seen nothing yet !

More skin-slicing down-picking abound on "Edge Of The Razor" and "Fed Up", while the rapid / rabid "Discipline" and the unlawful fun of "Behind Bars" is a pummeling speedmetal bush-fire.

By 1988, most bands of the scene had morphed from speedmetal to thrash with texture, yet RAZOR made sure the genre kept on killing and kept on being the fastest explosion on Earth.

Sadly the Violent Restitution LP would also signal the end of an era, the end of the Sheepdog era. But fear not evil invaders, Round Two shall ascend with 1990's Bob Reid led double-barrel headshot of Shotgun Justice CD.

*
Violent Restitution = full LP
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XpeHOgPKHs4&list=OLAK5uy_kWl43jRn3hWtZBSlq1ZRHegJ5PRSlFcxc
Live in Connecticut in 1988
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGWnNVUY2yM

March 1, 1990 - 2020: 30 years of: Shotgun Justice.

The speediest speedmetal of all speedmetals.

CLICK-CLICK !!!

While 80% of thrashmetal / speedmetal bands where watered down to mere heavymetal and / or absorbed into alt / prog elements in 1990, Canada's RAZOR sent another Grade-"A"-Fuck-You-Hey to the world by releasing the speediest speedmetal of all speedmetals !

Terrorizing the underground since 1984 with quality heavymetal, it is with 85's world-renown Evil Invaders that the Guelph quartet became: true speedmetal ! Ripping everything insight with aggression and power, but by the end of the 1988 Violent Restitution album / tour cycle, personal tensions where heating-up and the time had come for a needed change behind the microphone.

Enter new (and still current) screamer Bob Reid. When you though the music couldn't' get faster, couldn't get more aggressive, couldn't get more hard-core ...here comes 1990's blood-splattered-riff-tornado-melt-your-face instantly: Shotgun Justice !

The fastest speedmetal album of all time.

40-minutes of destructing speed with strong hooks and street-level creds, courtesy of Reid's punk-flavored vokills. Meanwhile, the riff department was full-house, you couldn't shoe-horn another note in there. Step aside Hetfield, Hanneman, Ian, Petrozza and Mustaine ...here's some REAL palm-muting.

You will not survive this assault.

While thrasmetal challenged hardrock, RAZOR challenged thrashmetal itself and in 1990, RAZOR where the band to be challenged against. Sadly, the changed metal landscape, shady record-deals and internal conflict torn the band apart and by 1992 they were no more. In the heavymetal history-books, RAZOR stands tall along other countrymen ANNIHILATOR, VOÏVOD and SACRIFICE representing Canada on the globe.

On a personal note, having played Toronto's Opera House back in 1996, I was thinking the whole time: Dave Carlo was on this same stage some years ago (see vid below)

POW !!!

*
American Luck = video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TwkULZQseaQ
Shotgun Justice = video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJuoL1qzbs4
Shotgun Justice = full CD
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XKX22zDGyKc&list=OLAK5uy_kx-rTTLb4te5VVerp_-2apPNJVsMLOFWc
Live in Hensall in 1990
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tId4qE-H-a4