Dew-Scented, Invocation

You can usually judge a metal band by its name. A good band name will allow you to easily identify them with their genre. The first time I saw the name “Dew-Scented,” I assumed that they would have a Gothic/romantic sound, somewhere along the lines of a Katatonia or My Dying Bride. That, and the only other time I heard the phrase “dew-scented,” it was used in erotic fiction. Don’t act like you don’t know what I am talking about.

Anyway.

Instead, what you get is a well-schooled thrash band that would rip your heart out, as opposed to pulling your heart strings. Invocation shows the band continuing on their path of releasing excellent thrash metal. What sets Dew-Scented apart from the others is that most of these neo-thrash bands seem content with playing really fast just for the sake of playing real fast. This band seems to have realized that if you take your foot off the accelerator just a tad, you can still be fast but add in welcome dynamics.

What always made old-school thrash bands like Anthrax, Exodus, and Laaz Rockit work so well is/was that their riffs had a groove to them. It’s that groove that sucked the listener in. “Global Hysteria” is a perfect example of that here, with its offbeat-yet-hooky guitars.

All throughout Invocation, Dew-Scented stick to the basics because they work. There’s nothing new here, but it’s still very good. This is a nice album to pickup on the weeks when there may not being anything else new out. Get it; you will not be sorry.