I remember having an argument in the mid-80's with a friend over the album "Speak English or Die" by metal-hardcore supergroup Stormtroopers of Death. The album just came out, and after listening to a copy of it on my friend's Walkman I pronounced it metal. My friend argued that it was hardcore. It wouldn't have been inappropriate if a TV announcer had stepped in between us and said, "Wait kids, S.O.D. are metal and hardcore!"
Few metal albums have had quite the impact of "Speak English or Die". Three members of the speed-metal group Anthrax (guitarist Scott Ian, drummer Charlie Benante, and bassist Danny Lilker) recorded the album in 1985. Their skinhead roadie Billy Milano joined in on vocals. S.O.D. married the metallic riffing of early thrash with the speed of nascent hardcore to form a unique hybrid that would influence an entire generation of metal fans and musicians.
Ian and Benante remained with Anthrax while Lilker went on to form Nuclear Assault and Brutal Truth. Milano formed the similar-sounding Method of Destruction a few years later. The band would frequently reunite to tour; one of these pummeling live shows was recorded and released in 1992 as "Live at the Budokan".
In the glory days of early thrash, S.O.D. seemed to be everywhere, their music as popular with skate punks as with longhaired headbangers. MTV's "Headbanger's Ball" used many of their songs to link segments.
It was during one of their overseas tours that the band got the idea to do a second studio album. S.O.D. co-headlined the Full Force Festival in Germany with Rammstein in 1997 and returned to the states for ten dates. "After the shows Billy asked us what we thought about recording a new album," said Scott Ian in an interview with Metal Maniacs magazine. "I said there's really no reason to...even after the '97 shows, none of us had the vibe to make another record."
Ian suggested the idea of a tribute record. After the word got out the band began receiving unsolicited tapes from bands such as the Deftones, Pantera and Sepultura. Although the tribute has yet to be released, it gave S.O.D. even more reasons to record another studio album.
The band got together to write music for the new record, which Milano admits was easy for them. "We wrote the record in about six weeks," he said. "There's a very simple process and it was pretty spontaneous."
They recorded the new record at Big Blue, a New Jersey-based studio co-owned by Milano. "Bigger Than the Devil" was released in May by Nuclear Blast records.
I caught up with Milano at their Nov. 15 show at the Fenix in Seattle, halfway through the band's "Killith Fair" tour of the U.S. with 40 Grit, Skinlab and Crowbar. Billy politely answered my questions while shooting pool, a cigar clenched between his teeth.
Lyrically, the new album doesn't deviate much from "Speak English Or Die", offering up the same dark satirical humor and misanthropic worldview, this time directed at junkies, racists and overpopulation. It's no surprise when Sergeant "D" makes an appearance on the lead track, stating, "I'm bigger than the devil combined with Schindler?s List."
Milano's lyrics have often been a source of contention for those who take them at face value and confuse satire with hatred. Does Milano think that the new record is as dark as the debut?
"(The lyrics) are more incorrect," he said. "Politically incorrect didn't exist back in 1985. S.O.D. invented politically incorrect. Now we've just taken it and we've honed it to a more specific type of incorrectness."
"We're a lot older, a lot wiser, a lot smarter, more witty, much more educated, and it comes across in the lyrics," Milano said. "I think topically the album is very similar. It's just that you have the wisdom of a thirty-five-year-old man versus a twenty-year-old boy."
Upon first listen, it's almost unbelievable to think that "Bigger Than The Devil" is S.O.D.'s second studio album in fifteen years. The band have sacrificed none of the power that made "Speak English Or Die" a classic. If anything, the new album is just as heavy as their first.
In fact, a few of the songs are more than a little familiar. "Aren't You Hungry", originally written by S.O.D. and later recorded by Milano's M.O.D. is here in it's original version. "We both split it up when we decided we weren't going to do a second record," Milano said, which explains why a signature Anthrax riff from "Imitation of Life" rears its ugly head.
Also, the band aren't afraid to poke fun at heavy metal's sacred cows, whether parodying both King Diamond and Slayer in the song "Evil Is In" or asking the proverbial question, "What ever happened to Celtic Frost?" in a tribute to "Celtic Frosted Flakes".
The very short songs are there as well. "Dog On The Tracks" clocks in at less than a second, arguable shorter than Napalm Death?s "You Suffer". The tradition of the ballad songs is continued, this time lampooning INXS singer Michael Hutchence and comedian Phil Hartman.
At their show that evening, the Stormtroopers took the stage to a sell-out crowd, some of whom had been waiting for this show for fifteen years. Irreverent to the core, the band played the guitar riff to Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit" with Milano shouting the inevitable, "You're dead!"
"Good night Seattle," he yelled as the band left the stage. The house lights went on, and the entirety of "We Are The World" flooded the P.A. system. By the time the band came back on stage, the crowd was either amused or pissed, none of which mattered when the opening bass riff of "March of the S.O.D." echoed through the venue.
The sell-out crowd was definitely one of the most aggressive I have ever witnessed in Seattle, moshing and stage diving even as Milano taunted them. They played the majority of "Speak English" and many of the songs from "Bigger Than The Devil" which sounded just as impressive live.
Some highlights included the medley "Six Songs In Nine Seconds," the forcible insertion of Slayer's "Raining Blood" into "Speak English Or Die" and a ferocious version of "Milk". The band seemed to have as much fun as the audience, whether chiding stage divers on their mush-mouthed microphone pronouncements or making latte jokes.
It was a tremendous show of force not only from the band, but from the metal fans of Seattle, and perhaps an indication that heavy, honest, pull-no-punches music can persevere into the new millenium.
By Bill Ragan
