Blasting straight outta Haifa, what we have here are a dozen slabs of low-down and dirty death metal nastiness courtesy of a palpably enraged mob of Israeli miscreants. Israel has, putting it mildly, a somewhat fractious political history, and the anger, fear and disillusion of growing up in a certifiable war zone makes its presence well and truly felt on Reflections.
To wit, this is claustrophobic, embittered stuff shot through with classic, heavy-edged riffing and an arse-tearing vein of utterly incandescent vocals. It’s not all downbeat misery, though; the whole affair is doused with a hefty dose of balls-out swagger that no doubt owes a fair deal to the band’s early days as a Pantera cover act.
Most pleasingly, the quintet manage to maintain an incredibly high level of consistency throughout, closing proceedings with a title track of imperious quality that plenty of their better-known Anglo-American colleagues could learn something from.
Meaty, gruesome stuff that deserves a place in every deathhead’s collection.
