HAZZERD – “Delirium” Album Review

ALBUM SUMMARY

REVIEW – IN SHORT

“Delirium” by Canadian thrash band, HAZZERD, is their third release overall, and 2nd full-length album after 2017’s “Misleading Evil“. I found the band thanks to the YouTube channel NWOTHM (New Wave of Traditional Heavy Metal). An early theme in Heavy Metal Culture history is finding bands via NWOTHM.

Let me get the negatives out of the way first, because there are a lot of good things to take away from this album. The big thing holding this band back are the vocals. Dylan Westerndorp deserves a lot of credit as the band’s drummer because he actually doubles as the lead vocalist. Unfortunately, his impressive skills as a drummer don’t quite translate to the vocals. While his tone is a good fit for any thrash band, there is virtually no range to be found. Arguably, I could play musical chairs with the vocal tracks and swap them between any given track and you may not notice much of a difference. That may be a bit harsh but I’m not one to sugar-coat. Okay, with that out of the way, lets talk the positives. The musicianship quality and technicality of this band are unbelievable. Every beat is in sync, every harmonized guitar riff is flawless, and many of the songs contain very complex pieces of music. (Note, I gave this album a 10 out of 10 for musicianship). The quality performances stood out to me on the first listen and are something I enjoyed and honed in on throughout my two-dozen or so listens. If you are a fan of band’s like Megadeth, Overkill, or Iced Earth, this album is worth checking out for the guitar, bass, and drum quality alone.

REVIEW – IN DEPTH

The album opens with some controversy as “Sacrifice Them (In the Name of God)” indicated some pretty strong stances on religion. Not a bad way to peak an audiences interest off the bat. The song starts with a harmonizing guitar right (a theme found throughout the album). The riff is a little slower and groovier than your cliche thrash riff, which tells me this album may not be a cookie-cutter thrash album. At about 50 seconds , the song changes pace by alternating leads between drums and guitars – I’m a fan. When the vocals first kick-in, I’m reminded of early Forbidden, not a bad thing but I begin to wonder if the vocal range will be limited. The chorus plays well as the guitars weave in-and-out with Annihilator-like scales and finishing with the in-your-face lyric of “you’re imaginary friend is a fraud” (referring to God). The solo after the second chorus and the following rhythm section really show off the music chops of the band. Also, the frequent time signature changes keeps me interested and invested in the song. The song flows well between riffs and ends just like it began – with harmonizing guitars.

The second song on the album “A Tormented Reality” lets the opening riff play out. It doesn’t rush into the song, which I appreciate. This track, however, confirms my suspicions – the vocals are going to leave a lot to be desired throughout the album. The vocals are more shouting versus singing. Don’t get me wrong, I’m impressed that Dylan is able to sing and play drums at the same time. I just feel that it is tougher to be a dynamic vocalist when expending so much energy drumming. That said, the second track again flows seamlessly from section to section and is a bit faster paced than the opening track. The guitar solo is on point – it does not feel random but actually has context to the rest of the song. Once again, we are provided some nice tempo changes throughout and the last section shows off more impressive musicianship.

Next, is “Sanctuary For The Mad”, which feels like their equivalent of Overkill’s “Hello From the Gutter“. By that, I mean a more mainstream thrash song (there’s even a little 80s hard rock in the verse). The song comes complete with galloping drums, catchy chorus, “lighter” riffs with simple song structure and less variety. At 3 minutes, 20 seconds in length, its quick and to the point. Standouts on this track are the guitar harmonies and again the solos – quickly becoming a trend. I’m also enjoying the mixing of the album. On “Sanctuary For The Mad” in particular, one guitar is more prominently in the left headphone, the other in the right headphone. It is like this through the album but used very effectively here.

For the fourth track, HAZZERD opens with a bass line that gives bassist David Sprague a little time to shine. I’m a sucker for bass solos so the song gets off to a good start. “Victim of A Desperate Mind” slowly builds into the verse by playing around with different drum beats before moving along with the song. When the verse does come along, pay close attention to the guitars. Listen for the subtle harmonizing by Brendan Malycky and Toryin Schadlich, its very underrated but adds depth to the song. Quick side note, my personal favorite section of the entire album is the pre-chorus. Maybe because the bass is so prominent. The chorus reminds me of old-school Annihilator again with quick shifts and scaling. At this point in the album – four songs in – the band has proven to me an ability to write songs with good flow. Throughout the first half of the album I haven’t noticed a lot of sudden turns of direction or unnatural changes. Overall, “Victim of A Desperate Mind” has the best collection of riffs on the entire album. The music breaks have hard-hitting riffs, the section tempos and rhythms are changed-up throughout the song, and the dual guitar solo gets a thumbs up from me.

Then we come to “Call Of The Void”. The fifth track on the album is an instrumental. The musicianship is flawless and certainly worth listening to but I am generally not a fan of instrumentals – especially smack in the middle of an album. In addition, at over 6 minutes long, it killed any momentum the album had going.

“Dead In The Shed” follows up the instrumental and is a fun song with fun lyrics about a guy name Bill who ODs on LSD in a shed. I know it sounds morbid but the band makes it entertaining. The band seems to be having fun here and isn’t taking things too seriously. There’s even a bit of a punk energy to this song and the groovy section in the middle of the song is great. It’s certainly a change of pace from the rest of the album, I just would have preferred this coming prior to the instrumental. Personally, it felt like a huge swing in direction.

The band gets more serious again with “Illuminated Truth”. The opening riff here is reminiscent of Megadeth or Forbidden. The bass is also given another opportunity to stand-out as it features prominently during the verses. Overall, this song is less memorable than some of the earlier tracks but the musicianship continues to be HAZZERD’s strength.

“Waking Nightmare”, track number eight from “Delirium” is a great example of wasted potential. The song opens with a clean guitar and is the most subdued section of the album. As the riff continues, we switch from clean to distorted guitar and the songs begins to grow beautifully. This opening section actually sounds like it could have come off Metallica’s “Master of Puppets” album. Then, just as the song starts to add pieces – clean guitar, to full band, to distorted guitar, to double kicks – it takes a noticeable change of direction. This is one of the few times in the album I got a sense the band forced two unrelated riffs together, maybe they weren’t sure where else to go with the song. I felt like I had to reset my brain for a new song all together. All in all, the second half of the song is fine, but I would have liked the band to have built the entire song around the opening, or at least come back to the riff later in the song.

Once we get to “The Decline”, the riffs are less complex then most of the earlier songs but is still a solid piece of thrash. I’ll admit that the lyrics feel a bit generic here, with a theme that is overused at times – human decline and everything is going to shit because of technology. By this point in the album my fatigue begins to set in with the vocals. I’ve now heard very similar vocal patterns throughout nine tracks and it is preventing me from appreciating the track as much as it deserves. The musicianship is still great with good solos and harmonizing yet again.

The final track on the album, appropriately named “The End” gives me some feelings. It is yet another instrumental track. 2 on the same album! I totally understand that instrumentals can be used as perfect album outros when used thematically but HAZZERD’s “Delirium” did not require 2 instrumentals. If anything, I would have told the band to get rid of “The End” all together and put “Call Of The Void” as the last track to improve album momentum. That said, I’m just the guy who gets to listen and judge other’s hard work. I am not the one working my ass off to write creative and appealing art so what do I know!

Overall, “Delirium” is a solid piece of thrash metal that most metal-heads will be able to appreciate. The musicianship is superb, production is clear and not over-produced, and the song-writing quality shows long-term promise for the band. The only things holding HAZZERD back on this album are the vocals and the instrumental tracks. All things considered, this album still earns a 7.0 and is certainly worth your time. If you enjoy “Delirium”, I also encourage you to check out HAZZERD’s other two releases: “Misleading Evil” and “Victimize the Innocent” (EP).