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TRIVAX “The Great Satan”
TRIVAX “The Great Satan”
By Dr. Abner Mality
Few bands walk a more dangerous path than TRIVAX. Their main songwriter Shayan hails from Iran...hardly a hotbed of free thinking or heavy metal. Their last album “Eloah Burns Out” was a thermonuclear missile aimed right at the heart of tyranny. With “The Great Satan”, they sharpen their aim further; the title refers to Ayatollah Khomeini himself, depicted as a monster on the cover art. This sort of stuff will get you killed in Iran. And beyond, since it is not unknown for Iranian fanatics to strike outside their borders as well.
“The Great Satan” is a difficult album for me to parse. “Eloah Burns Out” was a very visceral and at times violent album. On “The Great Satan”, Shayan and his compatriots have chosen a much more melodic and composed path. Simply put, the anger isn’t here to the same degree. But what has increased is the sadness. A lot of the album comes across as a lament. It’s not really doom or Goth metal, but melancholy suffuses tracks like “Operation Ramadan”, “Daemon’s Melancholia” and “Lawless Eternal”. Only “Here Comes The Flood” explodes with the violence we heard on “Eloah Burns Out”.
At first, I was disappointed, but careful listening reveals just how far TRIVAX has come as songwriters. They still manage to incorporate a lot of Middle Eastern touches into the music without using a lot of native instruments. Opening cut “Atash” is a slow building and low paced tune which brilliantly leads into “To Liberation And Beyond”. This latter cut is not blasting black metal, but it has a great riff and a very majestic vibe to it. “Lawless Eternal” again starts slow and progressive but bursts into metal at the halfway point. The playing on all of these tracks is outstanding and the album has a crisp, clean production.
In the end, “The Great Satan” is a worthy addition to the TRIVAX catalogue. It’s brave almost to the point of suicidal to challenge a murderous regime like this. That alone deserves a ton of respect. I do wish there was some more of the volcanic violence we had on “Eloah Burns Out”, though.
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