Coroner - Punishment for Decadence

For the longest time I felt that this was Coroner's pentultimate moment, highlighted by some of the most memorable tracks in my mental catalog. Listening to it now, I can see how Absorbed and Arc-Lite motivated me to get my ass to school all Junior year of High School, but I can also see the minute flaws in the Coroner armor here. The band did as well, soon abandoning the thrashier aspects of their style, tightening things up considerably in the future, but here, it's still Tommy T. Baron's show. Baron is one of my favorite guitarists, a master at the riff AND the solo, very rare it seems. So, while the record starts to lose impact on side two for me now, I can still confidently say that it is one of my favorite albums of all time, representative of a time and a place when both the band and I had a certain degree of recklessness, the two being a perfect compliment to each other in the turbulent late 80s. Seriously, the complete first side must be heard to be believed, all three musicians threatening to overstep their boundaries, yet somehow focusing it all together. Maybe too much reverb on the vocals, or a bit too loose in the production, but for all the tiny complaints one may bring up, this album is unarguably one of the true thrash classics, a must have in any archival collection.