Top 10: Teutonic Thrash Albums of 1986

Amongst metal aficionados, 1986 is universally agreed upon as thrash’s pinnacle. It was the year that acts like Metallica, Slayer, and Megadeth not only found themselves releasing genre-defining albums, but hitting both the charts and MTV. While mainstream rock radio remained hesitant to embrace this young extreme form of metal, the writing was on the wall: Thrash was here to stay, and not just on the coasts of the US. In Germany, an equally fervent thrash movement was taking storm. The fruits of this scene would prove pivotal in the development of subgenres like death metal and black metal, which would outpace thrash itself in a matter of years. Today, we go back to Germany ’86, and revisit the albums their speed-crazed, denim and leather-clad headbangers were cranking that year. These are our Top 10 Teutonic Thrash Albums of 1986.

10. S.D.I. – Satans Defloration Incorporated

Kicking off our list at #10 is the eponymous debut album from S.D.I., or Satans Defloration Incorporated. The band formed in 1986 and unleashed this platter onto in unsuspecting underground not long after. While many pan S.D.I. for being amateur and unfocused, especially in comparison to the band’s sophomore affair, Sign of the Wicked (1988), there is a youthful charm to this album that helps scratch its way to the tippy top of this list. The songs are fast and lose, at times bordering on crossover, resulting in an album that lies somewhere between Kill ‘Em All era Metallica and metalpunk bastards like Discharge, The Exploited, and D.R.I.

9. Deathrow – Riders of Doom

Although 1986 saw thrash largely moving towards darker and more brutal musical territory, there were some bands who adhered to the genre’s speed-driven heyday of ’83 and ’84. One such band was Darkness. Their debut album, Riders of Doom, sounds less like an album released in ’86 and more characteristic of a missing link between Exciter’s Heavy Metal Maniac and the aforementioned Kill ‘Em All. It’s certainly forceful and misanthropic enough to be branded thrash, but there’s no shortage of speed metal leanings throughout. By 1987, however, Deathrow would abandon this speed-centric sound, maturing as both songwriters and musicians, pivoting towards tech thrash on later releases.

8. Holy Moses – Queen of Siam

All hail the queen! If there’s one Teutonic thrash act who has never gotten their proper due, it’s Holy Moses. These cult heroes were releasing demos as far back as 1980, the first of which was titled, get ready for this, Black Metal Masters. Yes, even before Venom! After years of countless demos, the band FINALLY made their proper debut in ’86 with the ferocious Queen of Siam. Fronted by the unrelenting Sabina Classen, Holy Moses desecrated eardrums and souls alike with their combo-attack of devastatingly heavy riffage and demonic vocals, the latter of which could certainly be filed in the proto-death metal category. The band would only grow stronger on subsequent releases, even going full blown death metal come the ’90s.

7. Tankard – Zombie Attack

If there’s any band to blame for thrash metal’s brainless, beer-chugging, pizza-scarfing reputation, it’s Tankard. Granted, I’m not sure what constitutes for “pizza” in Germany, but you get the idea. For better or worse, this band has made a 40+ year career of thrashing and bashing out mindless neck-snappers involving beer, zombies, beer, metal, beer, humor…and beer. Even when they are making some broader statement about society or the system, it’s hard to take Tankard seriously, simply because they are the self proclaimed “Kings of Beer”. While that album title wouldn’t come until many years later, Tankard truly reigned supreme with their debut outing, Zombie Attack. With all due respect to their latter output, especially their ’80s albums, nothing touches the rabid intensity of Zombie Attack.

6. Angel Dust – Into the Dark Past

Before becoming a staple of the euro power metal scene come the late ’90s and early ’00s, Angel Dust first struck in the ’80s as part of the thrasher crop with their classic debut, Into the Dark Past. Admittedly, their eventual shift to power metal isn’t too surprising, as there moments on Dark Past that tend to lie closer to the likes of Running Wild and Helloween than Kreator and Sodom. That said, don’t let whatever primitive power/speed maneuvers peppered in between songs take away from the pure thrashing force of the album as a whole. No doubt about it, Dark Past can hang with the best and the most brutal of ’86, providing a unique, fantastical spin on thrash at its zenith.

5. Exumer – Possessed by Fire

Coming off as the inverted cross between Exodus and Destruction, Exumer came bursting through the flames of hell in ’86 with their debut explosion, Possessed by Fire. Dominated by a blizzard of double bass drum devastation, scorching hot riffage, and lunatic vocals courtesy of frontman Mem von Stein, Possessed is a Teutonic thrashterpiece of the highest order. Its musical contents never reach the edge of black or death metal, staying contained within the thrash realm at its absolute most deranged, but one could understand why future euro black and death metal musicians would gravitate towards this album. Think of Exumer as an antecedent, the same way Nasty Savage was to the Floridian death metal scene.

4. Necronomicon – Necronomicon

Although Venom’s reign as black metal gods was largely over come ’86, their impact on metal could not only still be felt, but was just getting started. Look no further than a band like Necronomicon. With their demonic lyricism, lo-fi production, and vocals completely devoid of melody, Necronomicon were an appropriate act to carry the torch of Venom, as well as Bathory for that matter, who would singlehandedly lay the framework for Scandinavian black metal a year later. Necronomicon is a painfully underrated slab of bestial blackened thrash, every song clawing your tortured mind and dragging your husk of a body to the dark side with confidence and force.

3. Destruction – Eternal Devastation

Speaking of black metal, 1986 saw power trio Destruction move away from their early leather-clad Venom-worshipping roots towards a more streamlined Teutonic thrash sound, complete with mosh riffs, increased technicality, and a more polished production. The end result was their sophomore album, Eternal Devastation. Although the wickedness of past releases was all but absent, the intensity and memorability wasn’t. Eternal Devastation almost plays like an evil euro twin to Megadeth’s Peace Sells…but Who’s Buying?. Both albums boast the same leap from raw to refined thrash, and fit rather well next to each other when played back to back. And much like Megadave, Destruction would go even MORE tech on the following album, but we’ll get to that in ’87.

2. Sodom – Obsessed by Cruelty

With a groundbreaking EP (1985’s In the Sign of Evil) and a string of crucial demos under already under their bullet belts, by 1986, Sodom are the most worthy heirs to Venom’s black metal throne. It was now time for them to grab their destiny from the hands of Satan himself, and the only way to do that was with an album. That album was Obsessed by Cruelty. Easily the darkest and most demonic entry in the Sodom canon, Obsessed makes the witching metal of ITSOE sound tame by comparison. If you argued this album was too blackened to be featured on a thrash list, I’d almost agree. Obsessed is brutal by even by today’s standards (sorry brutal death metal cavemen and war metal bros). In ’86? I’d be horrified to hear such hellish sounds bursting out of my stereo.

1. Kreator – Pleasure to Kill

Destruction weren’t the only band who said goodbye to their black metal ways in ’86. So did Kreator: A band so young that they needed their parents to sign their record deal when it came time to release their debut album, Endless Pain (1985). While Endless Pain is still an all killer, no filler classic to this day, it is apparent in the riffing and writing how inspired these youngsters were by Venom, Hellhammer, and so forth. This can’t be said for Pleasure to Kill, which nearly 40 years on, is its own beast entirely. The album people hype up Slayer’s Reign in Blood to be, the way they try to convince you it was the most extreme thing ever dropped upon God’s green earth in ’86? That’s what Pleasure to Kill ACTUALLY is. This is pure, unadulterated death/thrash, eclipsing Possessed at their own game a year after coning the term. Every song is a slab of speed-shattering cacophony, which sees the band pushing metal to its absolute farthest reaches. Fact of the matter is, without Kreator, your favorite black/death/thrash act today doesn’t exist, period. For influence and impact alone, we’d be fools not to crown Pleasure to Kill the greatest Teutonic thrash album of 1986!