Ruination cd: http://www.oriffs.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=5601

ORIFFS METAL WORLD SHOP www.oriffs.com

Combat - Ruination Review (8.5/10) About the band and the album... This band existed since 1984, and they are back with this unforgettable album., 9 songs, with 80s style thrash songs together with an excellent production. What one can say about the thrash riffs, the Great Bass (The Reign is Over) and of course for the vocals of Bob Eubank. The raw thrash metal riffs, blend perfectly with the vocalist, bass and drums. The production of this album is excellent and with attention to details. The cd is very affordable to buy with free international shipping, it also contains mini poster of the band.

Review : This is an album which will explode your speakers. If you are fan of Thrash metal then this is a must album to have. This band brings back memories of what true Thrash metal is all about. This album not only is a must have for thrash fans but also as an example for new thrash metal bands to follow.. I will not say more. This ia a great album from a great band with a perfect production. Buy the album from the band webpage not only you support the band but you add a thrash metal album jewel to your album collection.

Epic Metal www.epicmetal.net

Here's a band that goes for the throat from the word go, and doesn't let go while they twist and turn that knife in your gut! A big fuck yeah to the NYC band Combat for their latest CD release "Ruination". The production kicks ass all over the place and nearly knocked me off my chair while doing this review. I also dug the artwork and entire packaging on their That's Heavy Records release.

This CD is jam packed with nine songs that have a serious hardcore edge to them. I hear a variety of influences when I listen to this 3-piece with a serious attitude problem. I'm hearing lots of NYC influences like Agnostic Front, SOD/MOD, and Pro-Pain. But then I hear glimpses of old Slayer from the Show No Mercy days of yore with even a dash or two of the Bay Area thrash movement pioneers Exodus. Jeff Rossbach lays down some nice chucky guitar work and screaming leads that sets him apart from most hardcore bands. Bob Eubank handles bass duties and lead vocals - and he does it with some serious fucking authority. I liked his bottom pounding tone on bass and his vocals are rough and gritty, but very audible and make the listener want to raise their glass and scream along with him. Rex "Deadfoot" Rossbach blasts away behind his kit, delivering the metal goods with plenty of kicks and ear-piercing snare blasts. He's got a good drum sound and I liked his style . . . he mixed things up when they needed it.

I really thought the whole CD kicked total ass but "Destructure" was probably my favorite. The title track "Ruination" was also very killer and opens up with some wicked double kicks and searing guitar action - so it's sure to start a mosh pit on cue. Pick up this CD if you dig your metal hardcore with serious metal attitude.

Pete Altieri - Founder & Chief Disposer of Posers - Heavycore www.heavycore.net

Combat: Ruination cd review:

Gorguts goes thrash? Apparently so, because I'm not bullshitting you with this description. The music here seriously sounds like latter-era Gorguts covering Exhorder or Vio-Lence. It is in no way a comfortable listen. It's easily one of the strangest thrash albums I've ever heard. But on that same note, it's easily one of the most unique and memorable as well, because Combat have created something that I didn't think was possible: abstract thrash metal that makes most 'progressive' music look like Raffi in comparision.

Riffs, 'Ruination' is one hundred percent about the riffs, and what bizarre fucking riffs they are. You're taking basic thrash rhythms and patterns and filtering them through the weird melodic sense of late era Gorguts with a bit of oldschool punk thrown in for good measure. It might be just the guitar tone, but it sounds like there's a lot of weird, jazzy chord shapes used: much weirder stuff than the normal barre/inverted fifth stuff we all know. And individual riffs will come out of nowhere that sound completely different from the rest of the album: what's with that weird, almost country-inspired riff just under halfway through the title track? What about those weird high chords at the beginning of 'Corrupt Destruct' that sound like they belong in an Isis album much more than Exodus? Even the most 'normal' riffs are altered through weird time signatures or strange accidentals that don't make any 'normal' sense in the context of the melodies. Hell, it's really atonal in general, even for thrash: about the most melodic it gets is in the shredding solos that pop up periodically and flit out just as quickly.

Aside from the riffs, there's other weird stuff as well. Vocals are Arayaesque shouts that get up to a pretty ridiculous speed at times, like on 'Corrupt Destruct', which gets up to 'Dittohead' levels of word-spitting ridiculousness. The Anthrax-style gang vocals are also strange, a quick burst of punk primitivism in a soundscape of abstract riffing and song structures. Bass is unusually present, with a creaky tone which funks along with the guitars and occasionally branches off on its own in punk style before the guitars come crashing back in, like on 'The Reign Is Over'. Drums are also interesting: most of what they play is standard thrash fare, but occasionally things will get hyperkinetic and Rex Rossbach will let loose with a full-fledged blast beat completely out of fucking nowhere. It's violent and completely abnormal, and I've never heard anything quite like it. Yet despite all these forays into weirdness, it's still very pure thrash metal. This is really one of those albums you simply have to hear for yourself to really understand.

This isn't oldschool thrash, and it's most certainly not retro thrash ala Municipal Waste. This is modern thrash metal, but not like Nevermore or anything. Combat is the sound of a band from the era of oldschool thrash (this was, after all, Napalm's original name, which came full circle again after the band's breakup under that incarnation) having arrived in 2007. Combat didn't slip into nu-metal like Slayer, nor attempt to stay completely in the past like Metal Church; no, Combat is still doing something different. It's traditional thrash amped up and distorted way beyond its original form. You can clearly see that Combat stretches back into the 80s simply by virtue of their influences. But it's most certainly unlike anything you heard then, or, hell, even now. Had thrash never quite died in the 90s, and all those bands kept making music into the new millennium, this is what it might have sounded like as a whole: still pissed off, still full of energy, but more willfully deranged and atypical. Hell, this is the closest to thrash's original goal that I've heard in a long while.

Now, I can't sit here and say that this is a very fun listen. A lot of these riffs are awkward and off-kilter. Many of the structures of rhythm and songs as a whole are stilted and very strange. When I listen to this album, I don't headbang: I listen with an incredulous look on my face, trying to figure precisely what the hell Combat are doing with these strange, atonal riffs and linear drum lines and sudden tempo changes. If you're looking for something 'traditional' and easy to listen to, this is most certainly not what you want. But if you want to hear what thrash is like when it gets manipulated and twisted into something completely different yet true to its origins, this is the first that should be on your list. I'm not sure if I can say this is a really enjoyable album to listen to, but damned if I don't respect what it appears to be trying to do and the methods it goes about it. So I suppose that, as a whole, I like it: it's very different and seemingly not trying to be, and despite how atypical it is, it feels honest all the way through. Very cool and very, very weird...Noktorn (Metal Archives)