RIFFORIA
“Axeorcism”
Album Review by Iron Mathew

10/10

Rifforia are a heavy metal band from Sweden formed in 2016 from the ashes of fellow Swedish band Tuck From Hell – ‘Axeorcism’ is Rifforia’s debut album released in 2024…

…featuring a thrashy, traditional heavy metal sound! All the songs on offer are thrash fuelled “foot on the monitor” romps guaranteed to vigorously bang the head of every single metaller and thrasher around the world – the band rattling through all ten on offer in just thirty seven blistering minutes! Opening gambit ‘A Game That You Don’t Understand’ hits hard, very hard – and immediately! The heaviness is phenomenal, the band oozing the essence of the iconic NWOBHM, the guitar tone straight outta the eighties heyday for metal evolution! Rifforia may be over forty years and a thousand miles away from when and where heavy metal was born (in the UK for anyone who still doesn’t know), yet the Swedish outfit have got the sound of metals formative years spot on! And then added more weight – much more, creating a crushing crescendo of heavy metal bordering on thrash.

Rifforia are standing tall and proud on the bridge connecting the genres of thrash and traditional metal, stepping hard on the accelerator for the speedy ‘Sea Of Pain’ – the surge of energy fucking incredible, every metalhead and thrasher furiously banging their heads! The contrast between the albums opening double is vast, attracting a very wide audience to ‘Axeorcism’, as the band stride on with ‘Well Of Life’ – the intensity getting stronger and stronger! The band are hitting every listener, fan and follower with an almighty punchy crunch, devastating landscapes and decimating towns and cities! Nowhere and no-one is safe from Rifforia’s relentless roller coaster of bone breaking neck snapping metal, the album roaring on with ‘Built To Destroy’ – a perfect descriptor for the band! For the four piece from Dalarna are a metal machine built to destroy – the pace quickening once more to a fast gallop! The kinda gallop so synonymous with the iconic NWOBHM – metal traditionalists all over the world instantly falling in love ‘Axeorcism’.

And bringing the mighty foot stomping style of heavy metal to the fore, ‘The Devil’s Sperm’ is a skull crushing barrage of brutality – blending thrash metal attitude with traditional metal’s incredible melodious intent! Rifforia are taking an insanely wide tour of heavy metal territory with plenty of trips to the island of thrash, delivering an immediate and in your face album of intense and all consuming metal! And I’m fucking loving it – ‘CC Cowboys’ returning the sound of the legendary NWOBHM to the fore, along with one helluva chant style rabble rousing call to arms sing a long-able chorus! A chorus that’s fucking amazing, everyone everywhere involuntarily joining in to scream “hello hurray, we are the great, we are the soldiers of the human race” – eat your hearts out bands such as Saxon and Manowar, there’s a new anthemic metal band in town! Can this album get any better? You bet your bottom Krona it can, ‘Evilized’ marching on with pace, power and a level of head bang ability that’s just smashed right through the fucking roof! The band are on fire here, scorching the Earth with a red hot head banger, every mosh pit in the world turning into a sea of frenetic head banging!

The bands self titled song ‘Rifforia’, maintains the albums electrifying intensity, acting as a magnet to attract listeners from all over the world – listeners who favour traditional metal along with those who favour thrash! ‘Axeorcism’ is one of those unique boundary breaking genre hopping albums that refuses to be pigeon holed in to just the one genre of metal – ‘Welcome To Hell’ thundering in and roaring forth with incredible power and purpose. And no, it’s not a cover of the Venom classic ‘Welcome To Hell’ (off the bands 1981 album ‘Welcome To Hell’), this ‘Welcome To Hell’ is a Rifforia original, bludgeoning listeners with a thrash metal savagery – something the band have done all album long! And as the final song ‘Death Row Child’ comes roaring over the horizon, a quick moment of reflection on what has been a phenomenal debut album – hard hitting, immediate and immensely infectious! And so to ‘Death Row Child’, the band picking up speed to thunder on at the fastest pace heard on the album – the final hurrah a final flourish of fiercely aggressive head bang ability!

Overall, a barnstorming album of thrash infused heavy metal, ‘Axeorcism’ is very hard hitting and head bang-able to the max.

TRACKLIST

A Game That You Don’t Understand
Sea Of Pain
Well Of Life
Built To Destroy
The Devil’s Sperm
CC Cowboys
Evilized
Rifforia
Welcome To Hell
Death Row Child

https://www.facebook.com/rifforia/

This review is the property of Iron Mathew and Metal Gods TV. It is strictly prohibited to copy any part of this review, unless you have both of the parties’ permission, or are the band/record label/PR company in question. Failure to adhere to these instructions will be considered as Plagiarism and you will be reported to the appropriate authorities

---