Various Artists - Muscle And Hate

Choose the fast beat, choose the hard line!, Usually tribute albums has a pretty low quality and nothing you get that super excited about, definitely nothing you play often after a couple of times in your CD-player, after that it gets pretty bored. XP8 together with Sebastian R. Komor (Icon of Coil, Monofader) have managed to put a modern touch to Nitzer Ebb's immortal classics and without doubt the best tribute album I've ever heard.

Of course Nitzer Ebb's material that lays the ground is superb since they are some of the best EBM tracks that ever been made, but still the Italian XP8 and Norwegian Sebastian manage that together create a lovely blend between the sounds you know from both bands without loosing the feeling of the original.

The sound is very alike the sound we usually hear from Icon of Coil and the album is probably best described as if Nitzer Ebb and Icon of Coil after intensive mating manage to produce an offspring. "Control I'm Here", "Let Your Body Learn", "Violent Playground", "Fun To Be Had", "Join In The Chant" and "Murderous" suddenly have a modern touch and a new taste for your senses to explore. Paul Toohill from XP8 actually does a great job to master the voice of Mr McCarthy's even though it's impossible to go all the way.

Choose the fast beat, choose the hard line!

This review was written 2005 and initially published on Neurozine.com Jan 01 2005