2007년 최고의 스래쉬 메탈 앨범은 무엇일까? 두 말할 필요도 없이 엑소더스의 신보 "THE EXHIBITION "EXHIBIT A"" 이다.이유는 매우 간단하다. 엑소더스는 불가능을 가능케 했기 때문이다. 즉, 그들의 오랜 뮤지션 경력에 있어 가장 훌륭한 앨범을 탄생시킨 것이다. 많은 사람들이 BONDED BY BLOOD를 최고의 앨범으로 꼽는다. 맞는 말이다. 그러나 "THE ATROCITY EXHIBITION "EXHIBIT A""가 곧 그 자리를 탈환하게 될 것이 분명하다. 엑소더스 신보의 곡들, 리프, 드럼, 베이스라인 사운드 그 자체를 들어보라. 그야말로 진정한 스래쉬 메탈 앨범이다.TOM HUNTING, KIRK HAMMETT AND GARY HOLT 세 사람은 뛰어난 보컬 PAUL BALOFF를 영입한 후 1982년 엑소더스를 탄생시켰다. 이 후 몇 년간, 엑소더스는 전 세계 언더 그라운드 음악계에서 주목을 받았으며, 테이프를 교환하며 음악을 듣던 동호회 중심의 호평을 받던 작은 밴드에서 그야말로 ‘매우 인기있는 밴드’로 성장하게 된다. 혁신적인 작곡과 폭발적인 라이브 무대는 그들을 다른 밴드와 차별화 시킨 주 원인이 되었다. 엑소더스는 BAY AREA 스래쉬 메틀을 세상에 알린 장본인이자, 메탈리카, 테스타먼트, 데스앤젤, 머쉰헤드 등 수 없이 많은 밴드들에게 영향을 준 밴드이다. 1983년 커크 해밋이 밴드를 떠나 메탈리카로 이적을 했고, 그 자리를 RICK HUNOLT가 채우게 된다. 데뷔 범 BONDED BY BLOOD는 그로부터 2년 후 발매가 되었고, 시공을 초월한 스레쉬 메탈의 교과서로 오늘날 평가 받고 있다. 슬레이어, 베놈 등과 투어를 하며 엑소더스의 이름은 더욱 널리 알려지게 된다. 1987년 두 번째 앨범 PLEASURES OF THE FLESH가 발매되기 직전, BALOFF는 밴드를 떠나고 LEGACY 출신의 STEVE "ZETRO" SOUZA가 영입되었다. 이 라인업이 가져온 동료애는 창작력은 물론 밴드의 실질적인 성공을 가져오게 된다. 스튜디오 앨범 "FABULOUS DISASTER", "IMPACT IS IMMINENT"이나 라이브 앨범 ALBUM "GOOD FRIENDLY VIOLENT FUN", 그리고 컴필레이션 앨범 "LESSONS IN VIOLENCE"를 통해 엑소더스는 계속해서 그들의 음악을 진화시켜 나갔으며, 판테라, 앤스랙스, 모터헤드, 블랙새버스, 메탈리카, 메가데스 등과 함께 계속해서 수많은 투어를 성공리에 마치며 그들의 음악을 전파하였다.1992년 아쉽게도 엑소더스는 해체되었다. 1996년 원년 보컬인 PAUL BALOFF와 함께 잠시 재결성이 이루어졌고, 유럽과 북미 지역의 투어를 통해 두번째 라이브 앨범 ANOTHER LESSON IN VIOLENCE를 발표하기도 하였다. 이후 다시 휴지기에 들어간 엑소더스는 2001년 9월 LEGACY, ANTHRAX, S.O.D, DEATH ANGEL 등과 함께 THRASH OF THE TITANS 공연에 모습을 드러냈다. 이후 새로운 곡들을 만들기 시작했지만 2002년 2월 PAUL BALOFF의 갑작스런 죽음을 맞이하게 된다. 2004년, SOUZA를 다시 보컬리스트로 영입하여 마침내 궁극의 컴백작이자 신보인 "TEMPO OF THE DAMNED" 를 공개한다. 이 앨범 또한 매우 성공적이었지만, 엑소더스에게는 여전히 라인업의 문제가 남아 있었다. ZETRO, RICK HUNOLT, TOM HUNTING은 ROB DUKES, LEE ALTUS "EX-HEATHEN", PAUL BOSTAPH "EX-SLAYER"로 교체되었다. 이 라인업으로 엑소더스는 놀라운 앨범 "SHOVEL HEADED KILL MACHINE"를 탄생시켰다. 이후 개인적인 문제를 모두 해결한 TOM HUNTING이 마침내 밴드로 돌아오게 되었다. 이제 "THE ATROCITY EXHIBITION "EXHIBIT A""의 시대가 열렸다. 본 신작은 분명 듣는 사람들의 머리를 날려버릴 수작 앨범이다. .... ....
Rise up and revolt Overthrow the government Level all the temples Destroy the monuments
Return to anarchy Defy the Christian law Prepare for mutiny Prepare for coup d'etat
So begins our final riot act Now that you're in, there'll be no turning back Smash everything, wreck it all with pride The power of our revolution won't ever be denied
Reduce the halls of power To ruin and to ash An end to Christianity An end to holy mass
The dawn of an iron age Return to pagan law Lex Talionis We rule by fang and claw
So begins our final riot act Now that you're in, there'll be no turning back Smash everything, wreck it all with pride The power of our revolution won't ever be denied
Let not the sun go down on my wrath I let it shake the world Vengeance is the grudge I bear flag of reckoning unfurled You are the architect of your own demise so smile no more I am the gatekeeper, and you are mine for evermore
[Chorus:] Come greet the reaper You know the time is nigh This is the day of reckoning, your time to die Brave men they spin in fear At the sound of my voice Say goodbye to life so dear You no longer have a choice
Burnt black and silent, rust and blood upon my reapers blade I come collect the tolls gather up all the debts unpaid I call when you least expect but when you deserve it the most Behold the timekeeper the end is getting close
[Chorus]
The dead no longer have A cross to bear The dead no longer have Need to despair Death has come And set the snare Death will come When you are unaware
[Solo: Lee] [Solo: Gary] [Solo: Gary] [Solo: Lee]
The misbegotten have the gall to think them safe and sound They try to cheat the reaper scatter, hide, no matter, found The wheel of life is standing still For them it turns no more Now comes the soul keeper and you become my whore
Brainwashed into madness, your children are killers without fear Manipulate and dominate, stealing their lives for your hate Twisted perverted minds, think as we do or you die Demagogue, fanatical tyrant a false prophet seething with lies
I you fear, seeing through your lies You I fear, raping of innocent minds
Folow us blindly or die like a dog Blood mixed with sand for this holy war Your saviors a killer, you die for allah You are all children of a worthless god
Propagation of violence your one god a disease upon man Execution, crucifiction the answer for those not in your plan The penalty for contempt against your god is death and nothing else Ignorant infidels are subhuman and will all burn in hell
I you fear, seeing through your lies You I fear, raping of innocent minds
Folow us blindly or die like a dog Blood mixed with sand for this holy war Your saviors a killer, you die for allah You are all children of a worthless god
solo Gary solo Lee
Smite the pervets and the obstinate praising the death of the free United States of islam that's what you would like it to be Violate the unbelievers praising crimes against man Human rights mean nothing Doctrine of death a scourge upon man
I you fear, seeing through your lies You I fear, raping of innocent minds
Folow us blindly or die like a dog Blood mixed with sand for this holy war Your saviors a killer, you die for allah You are all children of a worthless god
We didnt pay attention to lessons learned in the past Soon the sands in the desert will melt from the atomic blast Mesopotamias ground zero for the coming of world war Thousands die in the sand And I still dont understand what for [Chorus:] As it was, as it soon shall be Were teetering on the brink of a world war III A repetition of history as you soon shall see As it was, as it soon shall be [Solo: Gary] War mongering leader of ours waves the flag of democracy Sending our men out to die in the name of bureaucracy The oil fields of Iraq are overflowing with blood Another man dies but the lies rain down like a flood [Chorus] [Solo: Lee] No weapons of mass destruction no threat to me Just one mans agenda for war, not a land of the free I never gave a shit about the Middle East But now we lie in the bed that weve made, start the atomic feast [Chorus]
The glorious frailty of the human mind Leads us to deceive the mother of mankind Nature is our master, we serve her through our deeds She teaches us that only death is guaranteed If there was a hell, there must I ever be Eternal life in heaven is but a fallacy So if death is nothing, but a path to be trod Walk with me and let me introduce you to your God
Come see an exhibition of atrocity An ocean of eternity One in which the shore you'll never see Or your God of make believe
You speak to the sky and no one answers back And yet you wager the word of God is fact The horrors we imagine in vivid clarity Become a spectacle, your God's atrocities A mirror image, reflection of your soul Just nature's play, all her children have a role God's an actor, the world nature's stage Our fates are scripted like so many letters on a page
A composition of atrocity The Story of Christianity A fairy tale of tyranny Recipe for catastrophe
[Solo: Gary]
Man's inclination Is to bend those who oppose to our will Does your great creator think the good are better made by ills? Dream after dream, time after time he who conquers endures The grand design of the mother We the disease, and her the cure
[Solo: Lee]
Unsatisfied longing for the slaughter The master often slays her sons and her daughters Death is but and undress of skin and of bone When you return to her, no sins to atone The ending is the same for the vile and devout Let all the poisons that lurk in the mind Hatch out She has predetermined our end Nothing more she will portend
Man creates the god and the god destroys the man Betrayed by their own invention the shepherd butches the lamb A lion at the head of an army of sheep when comes time to feed Like Saturn devoured his children they're consumed by belief
[Chorus:] I am the chosen one and I hold the key Behold the prodigal son This good I do lives long after me Let iconoclasm set you free
Christ is the same yesterday and today, forever a lie They concocted the heavens to keep all the puppets in line Narcotic, addictive desire to believe they won't go to hell A dog that has bitten its master that it once knew so well
[Chorus]
Figment of imagination Oracle of ignorance Corrupter of society killer of reason and innocence An object of man's creation made to fill the hole inside But that abyss has only been opened wide
[Solo: Gary] [Solo: Lee]
Wolves they guard the flock And they slaughter the sick and the weak Sorrow is all that they find When salvation is all that they seek The truth is the greatest lord where no fool commands the wise Religion ten times undone no room for compromise
Viscerated bodies planted deep beneath the earth They fertilize the soil and feed for all they're worth Within the garden of unearthly delights True meaning of horror's found and hell's within our sights
[Chorus:] He plants the seeds The germinate Black misdeeds, they pollinate Within the garden of bleeding's where the devil waits to introduce you to your fate
Endless orchards dot the land of corpses up on spikes Beauty's in the eye of the beheaded on a pike Bathed in lakes of fire until a cinder's what remains The stench of death it makes the flowers bloom in his domain
[Chorus]
Bodies hang from branches like grapes hang from the vine Garlands made of human flesh they decorate his shrine On the wind and through the trees, the cries of suffering For this is the garden of the king of the unclean
Turn on the havoc let confusion reign Random acts of violence shall not be done in vain A din of destruction an overture of rage Countdown to bedlam let the mayhem accelerate Soon we all will celebrate
[Pre-Chorus:] Feel the primal urge adrenaline surge join the altercation To the third degree at full capacity with no discrimination Total oblivion no phenomenon just par for the course To the starting line your time to shine On my mark we
[Chorus:] Quarrel! We subjugate We bring calamity Everybody cooperate Let's start the bedlam 1-2-3
Anticipating the coming of the brawl Collide like cannon fire but only on my call I provoke the melee and I fan the flame Coerce the herd into a Stampede They salivate Turmoil We aggravate
On my command everybody run amuck Slam into everyone never stop to give a fuck This is the pinnacle of tumult, It's what you've waited for so let the vortex Stimulate On this day We commemorate