In an age when every new-jack rock band lays claim to be the spiritual heirs to the likes of Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath, it's refreshing to hear a band that actually sounds like they've heard their music, rather than just about the stories. Raging Speedhorn, or The Horn as they must surely be known as within the metal community, are pure British metal, stripped down to the bare basics rock. A wall of guitars, thunderous drums, and a hate filled bellow from the lead singer. Be under no illusion The Horn aren't here to innovate, they're not here to save the world; they're here to rock.

Dispensing with all the unwelcome additions that Americans have burdened the noble metal beast with, this is as straight up as you can get. No DJ's or Hip-Hop pretensions, no techno influences and no baseball caps hiding male pattern baldness. The Horn's modus operandi is simple, turn the guitars up to 11 and shout about how shit the world is, occasionally they might slow the pace but The Horn know that they're onto a good thing here. So even when the tempo does drop below the predominant speed thrash they wisely keep the vital ingredients of end of the world guitars and malicious shouting firmly in place.

Kicking off proceedings with the immaculately black hearted 'The Hate Song' and its killer-opening scream of 'I hate you all.' 'We Will Be Dead Tomorrow' rants, bangs, thuds and grinds in all the right places, an hours worth of bruised eardrums later, they conclude with the suitably metal 'Ride With The Devil' all portentous, doom laden riffs, in the finest of Sabbath traditions.

The perfect music for barely articulate teenage males, angry at everything and nothing. 'We Will Be Dead Tomorrow' offers not just parent scaring riffs and the chance to shout along in your bedrooms like a stuck pig, but a way to channel all that pent-up hormonal frustration with the added bonus that unlike more MTV friendly pop-metal bands like Papa Roach, you won't sound like some whiney brat whose 'like all screwed up' because their parents told them to tidy their rooms.

For those of us whose animus is directed more towards bank managers and mortgage lenders than unlucky parents, 'We Will...' can still act like a tonic for the soul, a refreshing blast of something mindless and fun and after a particularly gruelling meeting the urge to play 'The Hate Song' on loop in the office is almost overpowering, and certainly more cathartic than anything Zero-7 have to offer. Raging Speedhorn, for services to rock we salute you.

share

end of year feature musicOMH's 50 Best Albums Of 2009 From the nearly 700 albums we reviewed this year, which did our writers love the most? Introduction 50-41 | 40-31 | 30-21 20-11 | 10-4 | 1-3