Review of the Album Tears by Japanese Thrash Metal Band Sacrifice

Tears is the 1992 studio album by Japanese thrash metal band Sacrifice and it is also their most recent but they haven’t released anything new since they got back together in 2013. One thing that must be mentioned before we move forward here is that congratulations to those of you that were able to at least tolerate the bad vocals in the previous album Total Steel. Some people cannot stand to listen to a heavy metal album that has such terrible vocals and for those of you that have been able to tolerate this album in spite of that one big drawback then I give you a big congratulations because it is not easy to do that.

The album’s cover shows a demon with tears flowing out of one of his eyes like a laser. There are lots of hands sticking out of what looks like a swamp. These hands are one of the foes in the video game Castlevania 2 Simon’s Quest for those of you that are familiar with that video game. These hand-like creatures exist in graveyards in that game.

Tears starts with the ominous and spooky song called Never Land Never Again. It is definitely spooky because I get the sense that there is a monster kind of noise in the beginning and the riffing is definitely heavy and dark. Breaking the Silence of the Night sounds a little like Metallica as the tone gets a little dirty and muted. There is the constant chant of the word “breaking” as there is little variation in the riffs.

And then, the first con of the album comes with the song called Your Soul as the vocals are super drowned out and I have no idea what the vocalist is saying other than the words “no way out.” Broken Heroes starts with the sound of waves as the acoustic guitar starts this one and finally, Japan’s Sacrifice tries something musically different for a change, at least for a short while. The song gets really heavy and slows down into a modern thrash metal song that has some industrial feel to it. The beginning part of this song at least in the first few initial seconds reminds me of Fear Factory because those guys used to have beginnings to their songs like this.

Japan has made strides in the thrash metal department but they are not quite as good as the United States in that category, partially because they have been unable to effectively market their music outside of their borders. In terms of being competent enough to play thrash metal and make it sound pretty good, Japan can still do that. They just have to work on their talents a bit more and start becoming exposed musically outside of their borders like the band Babymetal has been able to do.

The problem with the band Sacrifice is not that the riffs are boring or they suck. The riffs are good but it is just that vocalist sounds like he is some guy that is drunk and has a hoarse kind of shouting voice that makes this band a little less strong than they would otherwise be with a much better vocalist. Otherwise, they will not be able to stay competitive with the countless other thrash metal bands that exist in the genre.

I’d say that there’s probably thousands of bands in the thrash metal genre and what is on this album Tears is respectable musically. The first song in terms of its riffing is partially similar to the song Destroy. “Time Slips Through in Front of Your Eyes” starts out heavy as per the usual pattern of this band as the main riff repeats before we hear the fast picking style. But because this is a 1992 album, the sound is not as raw as earlier albums but the secondary riff in this song is still pretty good. The song is trying to get across the message that we should not try to lead an insecure kind of life because time slips by us as we live. Do I Fight for God is a song that lyrically is about a person who has no idea why he is on this planet? He does not know what he is doing. Is he fighting for God? What side is he on? Overall, Tears is a decent album but it probably does not match the band’s first album Crest of Black.

Other Japanese thrash metal bands

• Volcano
• Fastkill
• Code Red