Unknown Soldier

The Lowdown
Spreading the Disease is no better or worse than many of the albums that missed out on this year’s list, but as is often the case in these situations, the album gets the nod largely because of its historical importance. I’m not a huge fan of the album either despite the fact that Kerrang called it one of the best thrash albums of the year….. high praise indeed! The importance of this album is nothing defining, but is important in the forming of the commercial aspirations of the new and fledgling thrash sub-genre, as Anthrax would go onto to form the ‘big four’ of thrash metal throughout the rest of the decade and beyond. Their debut album the cliched sounding Fistful of Metal was a forgettable affair, but then a personnel change brought vocalist Joey Belladonna and Frank Bello on bass in and this altered the whole dynamic of the band for the better. These two joined band founder and leader guitarist Scott Ian, along with guitarist Dan Spitz and drummer Charlie Benante, and they would go onto become one of the most popular and most loved of all thrash metal bands (a very large and loyal fanbase here) Musically from the word go, Anthrax despite their potent metal sounding name which was named after a nasty disease, presented a much lighter and humourous form of the ‘brutal thrash metal’ sound than their counterparts and this approach was perfectly represented on the album cover. Also the band were east coast as opposed to the thrash heartland of the west coast and so were largely isolated in their development in that sense and their sound was certainly distinct to many of the other thrash bands out there. Vocally Joey Belladona was a very different animal than say James Hetfield- powerful bark, Tom Araya- satan spawn and Dave Mustaine- crazed maniac and these three had an expected style for thrash metal. Whereas Joey Belladonna on the other hand, was a more traditional vocalist that could’ve fitted in perfectly in any number of metal or rock bands from this period and in some ways kind of reminds me of a more playful Bruce Dickinson and he often reminds me of John Bush of Armoured Saint (both had ultra cool sounding delivery) and therefore it was no surprise that in the distant future that John Bush would replace Joey Belladonna in the band. Joey Belladonna was also the only vocalist here that was a full-time one, as the other three were either guitarists or a bass player first. The album starts with the downward spiralling sound of “A.I.R” which happens to be one of the most engaging tracks on the album as Joey sings ‘welcome to your nightmare’ third track “Madhouse” would be the single from the album, but it received little airplay as it’s video was banned, as it was said that it degraded the mentally insane (they were banning everything back then) later album tracks like "Armed and Dangerous" written when previous vocalist Neil Turbin was in the band is perfectly poised for a vocalist like Joey Belladonna and is musically is the most ambitious sounding on the album and this is followed by the equally impressive "Medusa" one of the best on the album. Spreading the Disease though is littered with a number of average, clichéd and dated sounding tracks even though they're fast like “Lone Justice” “S.S.C/Stand or Fall” “The Enemy” “Aftershock” and "Gung Ho". Overall the band dynamic produces a certain amount of originality with the Anthrax sound, which was characterized by pounding riffs, humorous touches and vocally the band went in for a mix between punk style shouting and the melodic rock delivery approach, something of course that would foreshadow metal over the coming decades. Straight after this album Scott Ian and Charlie Benante would form the spin-off Stormtroopers of Death, whose crossover thrash approach was far superior than what their main band Anthrax had issued out on Spreading the Disease (that album much further up this year’s list) in fact the only classic Anthrax release would be their biggest album the following Among the Living and I’m very much a big fan of that release.

Joey Belladonna- Vocals
Dan Spitz- Guitar
Scott Ian- Guitar
Frank Bello- Bass
Charlie Benante- Drums

Production- Carl Canedy

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