Flotsam & Jetsam – I Am The Weapon Review

Some things age gracefully, and get better with time. Wine… Cheese… Me…

We can add Phoenix-based thrashers Flotsam & Jetsam to that list, especially now that they’re four albums into a third act that sees them rise back up from the depths like their kaiju-inspired mascot. Reborn with their self-titled effort in 2016, Flots has been firing on every cylinder since, ripping through The End Of Chaos and Blood In The Water, and now this latest, focusing the fire of their melodic-tinted thrashing into a gleefully giddy blast of furious fun, scouring away the grunginess of a decades-long foray into more alternative waters, and bringing them back to a form they’ve largely lacked since all but their first few (and still career-defining) efforts.

Of course, this upswing isn’t news, necessarily – being nearly a decade old – but what is newsworthy today is that I Am The Weapon absolutely continues that trend. Is it better than Blood In The Water? Or Chaos, or is it better than the eponymous destroyer? Right now, I think so, yes, but I also think that, in the end, albums like this from bands like this are almost immune to direct comparison – though it treads similar ground, to similarly fiery results, I Am The Weapon is newer, and it feels fresher because of that. It’s the logical continuation of this newfound trajectory, and like the ‘Zilla upon its face, it’s a monster, a beast of a record that does battle toe to toe with the other beasts before it, which are just earlier incarnations of itself. (And as we age, gracefully or otherwise, don’t we all somehow metaphorically do battle with our younger selves? And we’d be lucky if we did it this well.)

From the get-go, opening track “A New Kind Of Hero” sets Weapon’s tone, proving in a matter of minutes that nothing has dulled the edge. The guitar work of long-time ace Michael Gilbert and relative newcomer Steve Conley (whose arrival coincides with the band’s upswing) is stellar, chiming arpeggios and blistering riffs atop Ken Mary’s flying kick drums and crackling energy. Like the best Flotsam before it, Weapon treads the border where thrash meets traditional metal and even power metal, the latter bestowed by the kingly voice of Erik AK, who’s in as fine a form here as ever, his soaring snarl now grittier and edgier than in the way back time, and the better for it. “Primal,” “The Head Of The Snake,” “Gates Of Hell,” “Kings Of The Underworld” – there’s no truly bad track here, with only the slightly bouncy, stonery bits of “Beneath The Shadows” as the weakest link. There are melodic hooks the size of Flotzilla’s giant claws in both the vocals and guitars, big enough to swat planes from the sky, and it’s just all so… fun. So immensely, ridiculously fun.

The only possible sticking point for Weapon overall is that, like so many modern thrash albums, it’s produced to hell and back, slick and stout, and with the drums big and powerful but also a little robotic and quantized. Still, that’s a minor quibble (especially considering how good When The Storm Comes Down would’ve been a zillion years ago with a production value of even half this one). Don’t overthink it – it’s a killer thrash record. Enjoy it; let the energy overtake you; and when it stops, re-press play and start again.

Forty years removed from thrash’s golden years, there are very, very few bands – including almost all of those in whose shadows Flotsam quietly lurked for all those decades – that can pull off thrashing with this level of skill, conviction, and pure energy. We all get older (hopefully, right?); and whether we get better as we do it, at the very least, we don’t have to age into our demise, and great metal never does.

May Flotzilla remain forever this young, no matter how old we all get.