The wait is over as Nervosa's debut album finally has been released. I have been looking forward to this moment ever since I heard their demo from 2012 with the smashing track Masked Betrayer. Something that impresses me is their fans on Facebook. Almost 90.000 (at the time of this review) and they barely released their first album. Then if you head over to Last.fm they don't even reach 2.000 listeners. That's quite funny, at least to me, as I can't help but think most of their likes is because a bunch of lads thinks that it's hot that some good looking women is playing thrash metal. Of course I only like them because of their music... not the other stuff... at all. But back to the matter at hand, does the album live up to the expectation? Let us have a look.
You will be greeted with an introduction track named Intro... (can you feel my disappointment over the track's name?) and it leads into the first track Twisted Values quite well. The introduction being a slow paced riff experience leads up to the break of Twisted Values and from that point on and until the ending of the album, it's a non stop assault. In spite of being covered by the thrash metal moniker, you can't avoid hearing the obvious death metal influences in the band. For me that is great and it adds a lot of freshness as there is death metal riffs here and there, and Nervosa really mixed that quite good. The production of the album is nothing special, it's basically just your average sounding modern metal album. However the guitar sounds quite good and adapts to both the thrash and death metal elements of the album. The drums and bass just fits, there's nothing really noticeable besides the snare got a nice hit to hit, but that's about it.
On my first listen the album didn't get to me that much but it definitely did on the second listen and so on. What makes this album really good is the fantastic blend between death and thrash metal, and that is something I expected to be present on the album. Because those influences were pretty clear on their demo, and it keeps the album fresh with the death metal influence so it's not just a non stop thrash metal assault, we got plenty of those. The distinctive and snarling vocals of Fernanda is something that also draws me towards the band as they separate Nervosa from other female bands. And just look at the cover! Andrei Bouzikov once again proves his skills to create an amazing piece of art.
So, out of the 12 tracks what songs would I recommend you checking out first? Go with Twisted Values, Justice Be Done, Nasty Injury and Envious to start with. That's my favourites from the album. If you like what you hear, then you should dig up their 2012 demo, Time of Death and listen to Masked Betrayer, which is my favourite track by Nervosa so far. Don't let your guard down because this three-piece female band will rip you apart at any given chance. I'd recommend getting your hands on this if you would like something different than your average thrash revival band. The vocals are almost biting you, and the mix with death metal and a heavy production really pulls this album up and sets it apart from the rest. Victim of Yourself is a solid debut that has some great songs on it, but also some fillers. It's going to be exciting to see what these Brazilian ladies comes up with next!
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