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Victims Of Insanity

    
       
       
       
     
             
Inner Enemy are a heavy metal band from Austria formed in 2014 releasing their debut album 'Victims Of Insanity' in 2024.    
             
The album features eleven songs across a forty five minute run time with a sound that harks back to the best decade for metal and rock evolution - the glorious eighties! The Austrian four-piece proudly stand on the bridge between heavy metal and hard rock to offer head bang-able and immensely infectious songs to get the pulses racing of both metallers and rockers, the album strolling forth with the minute and a half spoken word blended instrumental 'Letter To All' - the band marching straight into the bombastic heavy hitter 'Animals'. So bombastic in fact, it's gonna blow a great big hole right through the middle of the planet, Inner Enemy sending shockwaves rippling through all one hundred and ninety five (recognised as of 2024) countries in the world! The sound here may date back to a time when Pac-Man, He-Man, A.L.F. and teenage turtles ruled the world but it was, the prevalent sound during the eighties metal and rock revolution - a revolution that I was fortunate to have been a part of, as I was a teenager during the nineteen eighties! And glorious times they were too...    
             
...with many wonderful "coming of age" memories made back then! But it's the present we're living in now listening to the debut album from Inner Enemy - an album that marches on at pace with 'Crying People', the band displaying the classic gallop so synonymous with traditional metal. Feet are firmly planted on the old school heavy metal monitor here as the Austrian metallers adopt the iconic pose of heavy metal, every listener around the world raising their clenched fists high to punch the air in acknowledgment of a cracking metal tune! And head bang-able too, mosh pits everywhere turning into a sea of frenzied moshers going absolutely nuts - the slightly terrifyingly titled 'Slashed And Burned' slowing the pace to a crawl, only for the first thirty seconds though as a mighty thunder stomp rises to the surface, 'Slashed And Burned' powering forth to sound like a rockier version of Rammstein! Partly due to Inner Enemy singing this one in German (I believe), and the songs weighty industrial come groove come nu metal leanings similar to those of the German Neue Deutsche Harte band.    
             
And retaining the harder edged metal of the previous song, 'Pain' enters the fray to batter listeners round the head with zero mercy, 'Victims Of Insanity' moving away from its earlier eighties metal and rock sound to a more nineties thunder akin to the likes of Fear Factory and Machine Head. So what I first thought was gonna be a warm fuzzy trip down the metal and rock memory lane, is actually turning out to be an immensely varied avenue featuring a multitude of styles from across the last forty years, 'The Last Ones For Eternity' keeping the traditional heavy metal flag flying high! Albeit at the heavier end of the genre, Inner Enemy pounding the ground hard with immense force, '1-2-3' pacing like a regimental military march as it gets underway, the band throwing every style of metal they have in their vast arsenal at listeners - listeners who are lapping this up like a thirsty dog lapping up water! 'Not For Eternity (Part 1)' is a one minute tension fuelled intro that leads not unsurprisingly into 'Not For Eternity (Part 2)'...    
             
...the band resuming the pace heard earlier, this time singing in both German and English as 'Not For Eternity (Part 2)' scurries across the land. Inner Enemy continue to mix up the metal styles here too, attracting a fanbase wider than planet Earth - the Austrian outfit displaying more twists and turns than the Stelvio Pass through the Ortler Alps in northern Italy! And actually, the album isn't quite finished with the eighties metal and rock sound, 'Common Way' returning 'Victims Of Insanity's earlier, very strong old school flavour, the band serving up one hell of a rabble rousing chorus that everyone is gonna join in with. And bringing the album to a close, Inner Enemy stroll into balladry country with 'Abenteuer' - German for "adventure" - oozing a colossal lighters in the air atmosphere, every listener, fan and follower gently swaying from side to side.    
             
Overall, an album of immense variation, 'Victims Of Insanity' delivers metal from every inch of the metal spectrum.    
             
             
Review by Iron Mathew Collins    
             
Reviewed for Vlad Promotion    
             
             
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