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I really enjoyed Sodom's Decision Day album from 2016 after not really paying the band much attention back in the '80s, so I was psyched to get their latest release, Genesis XIX. After listening several times, I have to say it is a letdown. Founder/bassist/vocalist Tom Angelripper has expanded the lineup to a foursome (vs. a trio on Decision Day), bringing back guitarist Frank Blackfire and adding a new second guitarist (Yorck Segatz) and new drummer (Toni Merkel) and has turned Sodom into a Bay Area thrash band with slightly harsher vocals. Sure, there's plenty of speed and shredding guitar work underlying the near-death bellow, but the playing is much more precise than you would expect from Sodom. Precision isn't bad, and no one wants to hear a band that sounds like they can't play but I want more filth and grime from my Sodom albums and it just isn't there on Genesis XIX. I wouldn't say I dislike like cuts such as "Sodom & Gomorrah" or "Friendly Fire," they are perfectly solid thrash but the whole band is just bashing away at top speed, sounding like Testament or Death Angel, not Sodom. These guys clearly know their way around a thrash song, Angelripper's been at it for 40 years, but I feel like Sodom has lost sight of what makes them unique; melodic thrash that strains to contain the band's brutality. Genesis XIX is solid thrash album that happens to sound like most other solid thrash albums of the last 10 years.