Act III 1990

"Death Angel's third release "Act III", while essentially still a thrash metal release, contains a noumber of elements from other genres, and that may be one of the reasons why many hardcore thrash-heads dislike it; at the same time, a lot of people with other musical preferences liked it for its broad variation.

In many ways, "Act III" was ahead of its time in the perspective of rock in general, as it contains many elements that would become iconic of both alternative metal and hard rock later on, such as elements from funk and folk, and the use of acoustic guitar ballads, which bands like Extreme and Mr Big would later beat like a dead horse. The ballads on "Act III", however, are actually not bad, I think. What I particularly like about this album as that, even though Death Angel experiment with more mainstream elements, they never stray too far from their thrash metal roots. I also like how the band challenges traditional song structure and genre boundaries by incorporating elements from various styles into one another.

While I don't think that all thrash metal fans will enjoy this album, I think it will appeal to fans of alternative metal and maybe also more adventurous thrash fans (I think that, if you're into 90s era Suicidal Tendencies, there's a chance you might like this too).

(review originally posted on metalmusicarchives.com)"