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Triskelyon is turning out to be a rather prolific project, with an EP and two albums in about two years. Once again there's a bunch of guests, members of a number of mostly Canadian metal bands. On vocals alone, we get Amanda Jackman (Category VI), Armin Kamal (Infrared), Cara McCutchen (Mortillery, Naitaka), Dale Drew (Sea Dogs), Des Mason, Ellim, Pete Healey, Raúl Álvarez (Dark Order-Aus.) and Tim Tymo (Tymo). Drum Duties are shared between Raul Marques (Burning Torment) and Alexander Raykov (Antreib), while Dwayne Pike, Keith Jackman (Category VI) and Darrin Pope are conscripted on bass. Yes, I copied that from the press release. That's way too much name-dropping for my fingers. ;)

As I said in a previous review, if you don't like the vocals, just wait for the next song. The album opens really strongly with "Tektyranny" with Armin of Infrared on vocals, and I'd have been perfectly content if he had sung the whole album. For one thing, I like his vocals, but also I don't like some of the vocal work on several other songs. It's not horrible, but sometimes sounds a little off to my hears and often too loud and overshadowing the music. The chorus on "One Blood" especially irritates me. Now, in all fairness, I'm easily irritated, but here the guy is pushing his luck. Just kidding. But after some 30 listens, I keep coming to the conclusion that many vocal passages are the weak link of the album.

Alright, I may have given the impression that I don't like this, but let's get to the music which is a different story. Once again Triskelyon delivers a massive onslaught of powerful, pounding power/thrash. It's old school, but it also has a modern edge to it that helps prevent this release from being thrown into some "retro" classification. I can't say I'm reminded of any particular band, so the band is doing its own thing and not just going the easy way and borrowing old stuff and the music comes off sounding surprisingly fresh (that's pretty rare these days). The drum duties may be split amongst a few drummers, but they all come off sounding like they're trying to destroy their kit and hammer them into the ground—pounding metal, alright! There are a few guitar passages that are a little too squealy for my taste, but they are few and far between. Lots of heavy, sharp riffage and enough ear-shattering solos to swing that wax right out of your ears.

I found the variety due to the large number of guests to be a little distracting and, personally, that took some of the potential enjoyment away, but when I made abstraction of the parts that bothered me, what was left was what Triskelyon do best: energetic, pounding, powerful, finely tuned and razor-sharp power/thrash that doesn't need you to crank the volume up to 11 to make the walls shake.