The Crown have made no bones about their problems with Tomas Lindberg. They claimed he was impossible to be around when he drank and this caused them to split with him. Wondering what would happen next, Johan Lindstrand, their former vocalist returned to the fold just in time to record their latest offering. It is some pure killing metal and a great effort.

The album opens with “No Tomorrow.” The first minute of this song is random horror movie style sound effects. On first listen, I thought it was the effects played over the video in the movie The Ring but I watched the movie again (both Japanese and American versions) to be sure that it wasn’t the same effect. Regardless, it sounds similar and might be from a different movie. This effect is nearly a minute long and would have been better off as its own track but seeing as the album is called Possessed 13 it makes it much nicer to have 13 songs. The song has the rapid riffing that we’ve come to expect from these Swedish thrashers. Lindstrand is definitely back in full effect. His delivery is not very dissimilar to Lindberg’s on Crowned in Terror. Then again how much can thrash vocals really change? One thing that struck me was the guitar sound. It is dirtier than the last album for sure. The bass is also mixed louder and this gives the music a much fuller sound than Crowned in Terror had. The drumming is spectacular and sounds much better than Crowned in Terror did. The music is similar but the recording is much better this time around. Give The Crown credit for working out the bugs. At some points, the sound begins to resemble the production of Enemies of Reality. Is The Crown just the death metal influenced Nevermore? Probably not but it’s fun to dream.

“Kill Em All” while not directly related to Metallica is a song in the more traditional 80’s Bay Area Thrash vein. It would be easy to imagine Testament or Megadeth busting out this track. It’s an up-tempo headbanger with a catchy riff and chorus. “Zombified” follows the traditional Slayer blueprint to metal nirvana. The chorus to this song hearkens back to “Jesus Saves” and the solo sounds like one of the insane noodlings that Hanneman or King would bust out. “Are You Morbid” is another instant favorite that has some slight Cradle of Filth influence. I’m not sure what is meant by the title Possessed 13 but maybe The Crown set out to tribute 13 bands that influenced them with this album. It seems like the culmination of paying tribute to the metal trailblazers that allowed the genre to explode as it has in the last 20 or so years. “Natashead Overdrive” is more thrash logic in your ear.

The Crown has produced another awesome album. It’s good to see that thrash bands still exist without having to add too many death or black influences into their music. If you like The Haunted or Exodus, this is your album for October.