Right here we have Scaar, a band formed by guitarist Alf Johansson and vocalist Alex Jonsson in 1999. Shortly after, a full line-up was formed, adding a bassis and a drummer to the band. They released \"Scarred for Life\" back in 2002, and in 2005 their first signed full-length album, \"The Second Incision\", is released by Karmageddon Media. I listened to this album a few times before even thinking about what could be said about The Second Incision. It's a weird album, i'll admit it right now. By weird I don't mean weird and hard-to-listen-to music, I mean the way these guys play. Riff-wise, this is basically some generic \"heard-it-a-million-times-before\" type of riffage with a tone I dislike (almost sounds like Metalcore at certain times, to be honest). This type of stuff would've been quite good 15 years ago or so, but today it doesn't pass. It's being done to death lately, and i'm sure noone is quite pleased by that. The vocals are also right between thrash, death, and metalcore (hear the intro to \"Test Tube Killer\"). The drums aren't as bad as most of those featured in modern thrash bands, but they don't stand out either. The drummer is there to do his job and nothing, but no jaw-dropping fast-paced fills will be heard on this album. So I guess you can imagine how this band, very generic riffs throughout and nothing really shines out? Wrong.

Yes - I said the riffs were boring. But the solos? Now we're talking. I really didn't expect The Second Incision to have a bunch of astonishing and speedy solos, but that's what I got. In most of the songs - if not all - the guitarist basically wakes me up and takes me on a rapid and brief soloing trip. It the solos were transcribed into riffs, then this album would definitely own the living hell out of most recent thrash albums. But sadly, what Scaar offers us on their latest album is just some all-around emotionless modern thrash album which is akin to metalcore, and I feel damn sad having to admit that, especially after hearing great solos like these. Ah well, I guess we'll just have to wait for another full-length album by this Swedish band to see if they can keep the solos but get rid of the annoying riffs.

[This review was first published on the now defunct scandinavianmetal.info webzine]