The Forsaken – Traces of the Past (Century Media)
Neo-thrash/death with traces of black metal. In a word, Swedish-melodic-death-metal, a pretty interesting combination of The Haunted, Darkthrone, and Dissection.. Thrashy, fast tempos and guitars, shredding solos, growled/roared vocals that sometimes veer off into rasp territory, on-point, impeccable drumming, and all the dark themes your dark soul may desire. More aggressive, more technical, and even more melodic, all at once. Really good stuff, not only breaking new ground, but making the old ground seem a lot more interesting, too.

Tracks:
1) Groove-laden beginning that transforms into an Arch Enemy-like riff-fest with a killer solo towards the end.
2) Mid-tempo, with yet more killer solos all around, and a ton of guitar squeals, as well as a BREAKDOWN!
3) Old-school death sound, especially the vocals, mixed with old-school thrash. Constant drumming madness and 30-note riffs. The last two minutes get really, really interesting...
4) Starts off with a killer (albeit relatively simplistic and overly melodic) riff that you just expect the singer to say “Go!”, but he never does. Instead, we get spoken word samples and a devastating pace. Think American brutal death mixed with the futuristic black metal sound of Forlorn, ...And Oceans, etc.
5) Now this is pure gold! Pure, unabashed NWOSDM. Straight to the point, goes for your throat and kills with guitar squeals, runs, and solos, and then buries you with breakdowns.
6) Intro takes about 20 seconds to fade in and then it’s old-school death, once again, mixed with more melodic thrash and sick vocals, all wrapped up in a mid-tempo churner packed with solos.
7) Thrash! But mixed with a lot of the brutality of the Florida scene. Nice.
8) Another slow fade-in intro, and then more by-the-numbers NWOSDM.
9) The intro riff is a perfect example of the kind of riff preferred by these guys: long, complex, and pretty damn winding. Carries the whole song, though, so I can’t complain. Has an unbelievably cool mid-section.
10) Wow, who invited Kerry King to the studio? Arrangement is a lot more like modern death/thrash-core, but the brutality is up a whole lot of notches and there’s no stopping those drums.
11) Metallica cover (Blackened), done pretty well, with a maddening double-bass section that Lars can only dream of.
12) Another Metallica cover (Creeping Death), played really fast, and overall not bad at all.
13) A Slayer cover (Spirit In Black), I love the original and these guys can’t fuck it up even if they tried. And try they do.
14) Last cover (Grave), sounds like the one they’re most comfortable with.
15) An original, unreleased song, and I can’t understand why, this song fuckin’ smokes! Killer riffs, way old-school, total thrash punishment with ultra-brutal, guttural vocals.