This is the End of Irony.

Looking at these song titles ("Juggernaut of Metal", "The Hydra Coils Upon This Wicked Mountain"), all I can think of is that stupid ass Metalocalypse cartoon that so many halfheads out there have turned into a viable cultural phenomenon. Listening to this record, all I can think of is what a dive into weak minded sloppily played stupidity Lair Of The Minotaur have taken since their pretty solid first full length record Carnage back in 2004. That record is what I want High On Fire to sound like at all times, "The Wolf" being one of my favorite metal songs in the last five years. On The Ultimate Destroyer, though… blech.

Don’t get me wrong, The Ultimate Destroyer has some moments ("Cannibal Massacre" is a good number, but you can just get the EP of the same name..it has that track without all the lame-assotry that surrounds it on this release) , but for the most part they’ve played up the Metalocalypse-isms as to appeal to the hipster jerk offs and unfunny metal(half)heads that made it so a non-existant animated band like Deathclock or whatever they’re called can be a success, complete with a chart-topping album and a HEADLINING CONCERT TOUR…FOR A CARTOON. It’s a sad and beautiful time to be a metal fan… by "beautiful" I mean "assraping"… but I digress. Lair of the Minotaur have turned into another one of these "fun party time" bands ala Municipal Waste, which amounts to a bunch of mongoloids making unfunny metal jokes on message boards because they’re one-dimensional simps who have no grasp on how to converse about anything else other than shitty Direct to DVD backyard tits ‘n gore movies and bland groove metal bands from the 90s. I’m sick of self-consciously "fun" bands, mostly because their idea of "fun" is being fucking dumb, playing video games, and drinking light beer… but again, I digress.

Metal bands of this nature should scare the fucking fuck out of you while still being fun. Slayer was a "fun" band, and they sang songs about serial necrophile Nazi rape wolves or whatever… horror/exploitation movie sort of stuff, which is what even so called "fun" bands used to sing about (Venom, Cannibal Corpse, etc.) they were telling stories, indulging their prurient interests, and putting it a metal thrashing mad package that you could bang your head listening to, making Joker faces, and so forth, while still putting forth a product that would offend and incite many. Current examples are bands like Pig Destroyer or Cretin, who put out these savage, heavy as your nail-gunned junk thrash/grind records that bring the mosh and have over-the-top-bordering-on-the-absurd lyrics (Pig Destroyer’s surrealist prose about killing girls, Cretin’s trailer park rhymes about feral chicken coupe children and sexually abused cross dressers). Those two bands actually have their own ideas and present them in the context of a metal record that could be considered fun… Lair of the Minotaur doesn’t do that though… they just sing about being metal and big and metal and liking metal and listening to metal, throwing out tired imagery about serpents and giants, hoping that people will just get the joke and laugh because they’ve heard it before… sort of the "Meet The Spartans" approach to music making… throw out as much references as possible as to instantly appeal to those who’ll say "Oh yeah I remember that tehehehehehehehe there are smart take money."

I just can’t get over how dull this record is… but it’s still light years better than their newest one War Metal Battle Master (*shudder*), which completes their decent into a novelty act for the simple and the cock-lame. Just stick with Carnage and the Cannibal Massacre EP which are "fun" records that still sound savage and ugly.

Written By: Nick Benoitschwitz