VIKING - Man Of Straw LP (Yellow/Black/Blue Splatter Vinyl)

Transparent piss yellow w/ black & blue splatter, limited to 300 copies.
Includes lyric sheet and poster.

When I got a hold of this album some time in the late-90’s, I had no idea that this act were actually in a pristine, rough-around-the-edges “do or die” situation on their debut a year earlier. Not that it mattered that much as this piece of metal remains one of the highlights on the whole US scene, a primal slab of stupendous, ass kicking rifforamas that only trve Viking descendants were capable of producing. This effort takes a nice central role in the thrash metal kaleidoscope, between the aggressive bashing of Slayer, Dark Angel and Morbid Saint, and the technical/progressive excursions that started becoming prevalent in the late-80’s thanks to acts like Realm, Toxik, Watchtower, and Blind Illusion. This mediator’s stance was another voluminous pool also occupied by Wargasm, Vio-Lence, Wrath, Mordred, early Flotsam & Jetsam, and the debuts of Death Angel, Heathen and Forbidden. These artists borrowed from both sides, more readily from the latter, with some eventually ending up on the more proficient, more complex side of the spectre.