Satan's Host
Great American Scapegoat
Moribund
The host with the most
I could have done without the Satanic summoning/invocation/conjuring that opens this album. The goddamn sulfur stench from the “lesser” demon that appeared (and scorched a totally sloppy-looking pentagram into my floor) reeked like an egg salad sandwich fart. Plus, convincing the little goat-y fucker who arrived in that fetid puff of smoke that it was all some kind of misunderstanding (“I, uh, dialed the wrong number?”) wasn’t exactly easy.
But that’s Satan’s Host for ya. Always an adventure. The cult power metal band from the ’80s that refused to die—even though their drummer D. Lucifer Steele did in 1989—has reinvented itself in the ’00s as a blackened/death/thrash outfit and is cranking out new releases with a vengeance. Great American Scapegoat is their fifth post-reunion effort and, as one might guess from the opening “Invocation…666,” it’s all about evil. Even the 45-second guitar solo that precedes “Black Order” has a name (“7 Strings Sin”!) that speaks to this Colorado trio’s tr00 wickedness.
Silly satanic trappings aside, it’s hard to deny the authenticity and quality of Scapegoat. Satan’s Host’s resurrection in the extreme era is successful mostly because they’ve clearly been paying attention to how metal has changed in the time they were inactive, but they also haven’t completely abandoned their old school roots—the trad-sounding guitar solos and epic power metal arrangements actually make some sense. I would, however, go ahead and skip that first track, unless of course you happen to be hosting the black mass at your place that week. —Adem Tepedelen
