Beyond Salvation – The Final Nail
Release Date: 29th May 2026
Label: Self-Released
Bandcamp
Genre: Thrash, Hardcore, Metalcore.
FFO: Sylosis, Hatebreed, Sepultura.
Review By: Mark Young
The Final Nail starts with the introduction that is Regresus, and as I’m fond of saying, has to act as lead-in for what comes next. It does what it needs to do and is then let down by Descending into Darkness. I’ll explain this now: your first song has to be the ‘one’, it has a limited opportunity to sell the album to you; to make you want to listen to it all in one sitting. I expected Descending to come in and just crush me, instead it just happened. It felt like a massively wasted moment, and it’s something that it might not recover from. Let me say that in the actual music is what you would expect to hear, certainly given the influences listed below. Incarcerate starts like Descending should have done, superfast riffs into a break-down that constantly moves and has more of that 1st track vibe I was expecting.
The Hatebreed mid-crawl is evident on The Final Nail, and depending on your feelings towards them, it might not appeal. Personally it does what it needs to do it continuing to drag proceedings along, and like Incarcerate has some fiendish lead breaks, which are always welcome. Cleansing comes in with a point to prove and doing it as quickly as possible. You can see just from these that they have the necessary tools to write effective metal that can straddle between hardcore and thrash. The end result is that it tries to be all things at the same time. The Waiting is an example, running from one genre to another, replete of riffs but lacks the impetus that Cleansing had. It’s likely that I’m approaching it from a slightly skewed perspective, but speed is a necessary ingredient within thrash, and yes there were songs that occupied that slower tempo but were often offset by a number of fast ones. Scorned does that, starting with a sense of speed that is implied, which for me is great. It zips along, with some cracking triplets thrown in before they pull the brake and deploy the solo break. Again, it achieves what it set out to do and does it well.
Running into the final turn, they drop in Broken Reflections which picks up on the good work from Scorned and keeps it going but is overlong. It needed trimming in the same way as Cleansing, make it a short blast, and I’ll love it forever. Endless Cycle on the other hand is a monster, picking the pace up and single-handedly dragging the album to its close. This one has the lot, speed, technical and emotional driven melodies and a savage attack. It places a lot of pressure on The Storm to knock it out of the park as the final track. The Storm manages to do that, meaning that they wrap on an absolute top class blast of metal. Over the course of the 7 minutes they get you by the throat and shake until it snaps. It’s how I envisage a final track should be, it should be the killer, the complete final word and it is a stormer.
On balance, it’s an album that succeeds in a lot of places, its commitment to offering more in its sound is appreciated but at the same time means that they don’t always hit the target. When those shots do land, my word they are royal; focused, aggressive and know instinctively what ‘good’ sounds like. The highs are plentiful, and there are some top moments here, and some I didn’t take to. Still, its quality metal, and you can’t argue with that!
(3.5 / 5)
