Trident - 'World Destruction'

A good, if unoriginal, album toeing the lines between death, black, and thrash metal.

There’s absolutely nothing new occurring on World Destruction, the debut album from Trident. A “supergroup” of sorts (although Trident are not being billed as such), Trident is made up of many veterans of the Swedish scene, including Tobias Sidegard and Alex Friberg, the vocalist and bassist, respectively, from Necrophobic. Other members include Johan Norman, former rhythm guitarist for Dissection.

The music on World Destruction is a pretty typical mix of black and death metal, but with a much greater concentration upon mid-paced songs, a certain amount of thrash metal vibe, and a sense of melody more prominent than that present in the music of some of the rougher Swedish acts, including Necrophobic.

The music works best when melody alternates with the all out blasts and thrash metal gallops that periodically make an appearance. Nice examples of this mix, backed up with strong songwriting, include “Jaws of Satan” and “Stockholm Bloodbath.” A few short, slow moments with plenty of melody are present, as well, such as the album’s intro and “Blackened Souls,” a nice piece with acoustical guitar, slow riffs, and wailing solos.

Definitely some of the music on World Destruction is quite well done, if typical, with professional quality songwriting, musicianship, and so on. However, I did find my attention drifting as I wade deeper into the album, as the stronger songwriting appears in the first half of the album. Also, the lack of originality in Trident’s music is not able to sustain interest over the long haul.

In short, World Destruction is a decent album for the genre and doesn’t really have any glaring flaws. Just don’t expect anything other than typical Swedish metal traipsing through the various genres.

Disclosure: A review copy was provided by the publisher. For more information, please see our Ethics Policy.