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ACID DRINKERS
25 Cents For A Riff

Mystic Production (2014)
Rating: 9/10

When Poland’s Acid Drinkers released their debut album Are You A Rebel? back in 1990, I for one didn’t think they would carve out a 25-year career covering some 16 full-length releases, two EPs, a couple of singles and a brace of videos.

It’s fair to say that Acid Drinkers is an underrated yet highly prolific act which in reality is responsible for some of the best thrash metal I’ve heard over the decades.

These guys span the spectrum of groove metal and chunky thrash metal, and also take in influence from punk, Motörhead and traditional metal. They are without boundaries within their field, because as a crossover act they have somehow churned out cool, infectious album after cool, infectious album and this new slab of dirty metal is no exception. Twelve bruising, catchy-as-hell numbers which stick in the head and provide instant satisfaction and reek of cult.

Of course, what helps in regards to ingredients is that three of the members have been with the band since the 80s. Titus (aka Tomasz Pukacki) has that grizzled growl which gives the sound extra punch, but you feel that this guy is capable of any vocal style, transcending the limits of thrash, hardcore, punk, doom and industrial. That’s where I’d put the volatile sound of Acid Drinkers; a riveting hybrid of Corrosion Of Conformity, Bad Brains, Monster Magnet, Motörhead, White Zombie, Testament, Slayer and just about everything else in-between. In a sense it’s simple, but bringing with it the same cauldron of versatility as fellow cult metal heroes and general bruising nobodies Agony Column.

From the off its brilliant chunky riffage you cannot argue with; the opening title track is a ravenous stomp of rattling percussion and somehow commercially bruising riffage where Titus becomes akin to a demonically possessed James Hetfield (Metallica) as he slurs over a simple yet crushing percussive slab and rhythmic pummel. It’s the sort of thrash metal masterpiece that one is left scratching their head over, because surely all this stuff was written and exhausted by 1991 and yet Acid Drinkers is a peculiar blend of psychedelic Black Sabbath and war-torn thrash bestiality before pulling out further weaponry for the groove-metal hip-hop slam of ‘Me’ with the samples of “disgusting” resonating through the ears.

This time Titus takes on a hostile squawk as the flailing guitars of Popcorn (aka Dariusz Popowicz) and Jankiel (aka Wojciech Moryto) carve out some sort of swampy backwoods stomp, hinting at the more primitive thrash aspects of early White Zombie, only delivered with more animosity and coolness. And there’s no lull in this odd procession; ‘God Hampered His Life’ is a pure thrash juggernaut of hyper-speed, while ‘Don’t Drink Evil Things’ with its percussive introductory roll is majestic yet oily rock ’n’ roll fury of the highest order.

Acid Drinkers take on the guise of doom metal gods; sun-blessed yet speckled with rain, they have mastered a drunken anthem that only Sabbath could have dreamed up and made sound so evil. ‘Chewed Alive’ is another of those rusty, churning beast of a thrash-doom number and ‘Not By Its Cover’ follows suit, again hinting at Corrosion Of Conformity at its best with a dash of Pantera too. This is where Acid Drinkers is at; a ploughing, pummelling, pulverising yet strangely thrashing psychedelic stoned bag of bloody stones to dig graves by.

Neil Arnold

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