With most good bands, I remember riffs. Walk up to any metal kid in your neighborhood and ask him to recite the opening riff from ‘Angel of Death’ by Slayer (because he might know the riff from Thin Lizzy’s song of the same name). Actually, chances are, you are that kid. So go on. Hum the riff to yourself. You could, couldn’t you? That’s the mark of a good song.

Krisiun, while definitely catalogued as a good band, have some riffs here and there that come to memory in a heartbeat (‘Dawn of Flagellation,’ ‘Bloodcraft,’ and ‘Ravager’ come to mind), but I don’t necessarily remember them for their riffs; rather, I mark them by the super-cool riff timings they utilize. Regarding the aforementioned ‘Bloodcraft,’ it took me about ten listens to figure out how many five note bursts played out prior to the first words being sung. But you know what? It’s not that I was frustrated – I loved having to revisit the track to really figure it out, and I’ve had to do that with every Krisiun record, Southern Storm bearing no exception.

‘Slaying Steel’ does a good job at warming you up to the mesmerizing riffage that you’ll witness again and again throughout the album. But unlike other releases from other veteran artists this year, Krisiun’s 18 year pedigree still has yet to be tarnished. There’s lots of really memorable moments on this one, just like there were on 2006’s AssassiNation, most notably the descending triplet riff in ‘Minotaur,’ the brooding buildups in ‘Contradictions of Decay,’ and current favorite ‘Whore of the Unlight,’ which on the whole trumps many a song in their catalogue.

They also chose to pay homage to Brazilian metal gods Sepultura with a cover of the ever-awesome ‘Refuse/Resist,’ which has been done to death by countless others. Admittedly no one’s been able to top the original (not many bands can out-perform the original track), but Krisiun comes closest of those I’ve heard, with an interesting take on the bridge solo and the most accurate Igor Cavalera impersonation around (and I mean that in the best way possible, trust me). A great track done by one of the few bands I’d deem acceptable to do a Sepultura cover (and yes, I do have the power to deem tracks acceptable for specific bands to cover).

If there’s one thing to be said about Krisiun, it’s that when you pop in one of their CDs, it is unmistakably Krisiun. For those that don’t like that trigger-happy commando death metal sound that the mightiest metal monsters south of the equator have concocted, you might want to pick Southern Storm up at a local retailer anyways. If AssassiNation wasn’t enough to convert you last time around, Southern Storm will gladly take you by the hand and lead you to the promised land.

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