Review: Royal Rage “Evolve” [Sliptrick Records]

The Brazilian metal scene has always been intriguing and overwhelmed by a plethora of great bands. To me, the Brazilian metal scene is a metal community of people who mostly love old-school and traditional metal. Of course, there are many bands with a modern approach, which is usual because we all live in a world where musicians are looking for something new, so it is okay when many music genres and approaches exist.

Royal Rage was formed in 2010 (originally under the name Royal Rampage), and Evolve is their second full-length album so far. Their debut album, Conquer, was released back in 2018, six years ago, but since I have never heard of this band before, I’m unable to judge if there has been some evolution of the band since their debut. So, I will tell you about this new album.

First, Evolve is a real longplay album as it contains 13(!) tracks with around an hour of playing time! To me personally, the ideal album length is under 40 minutes, but that’s just my humble personal opinion. Musically, Evolve is classical thrash metal mixed with speed metal, highly influenced by Exodus and Testament. Actually, if you are looking for some traditional thrash metal of the old days, you will find Evolve good for you. Of course, there is a lack of the hyper power made by the aforementioned legends. However, Royal Rage sounds good enough to be praised by thrashers worldwide! The guitar parts are raging, with really catchy tempo changes and thresholds, bass lines are tight, drumming is destructive, and vocals are full of fury! Some tracks sound marching, some just furious, and in any case, each track forces your head to headbang. The album artwork and the band’s logo give the feeling of classical thrash metal records as well.

Evolve is not the kind of “best album of the year” but comes with huge potential, sounds worthwhile, and the main thing – in a classical way! Let’s headbang together!