As night follows day the last few years have been peppered with album releases and UK tours from the mighty Cleveland noisemakers known as Midnight. such is their output and the quality of it I feel like a kid at Christmas waiting, knowing it’s coming. The album drops and I get the cans in the fridge and prime the stereo because the unholy racket is a coming. You know already that before you’ve clapped eyes on the artwork it’s going to tickle your pleasure receptors and have you nodding like head bobbler on an F1 car with your bullet belt and leather gloves on it’s time to give in and offer up your undivided attention because Athenar and the gang are on the stereo. Beelzebub is ying the bellows for some ‘Hellish Expectations’ and enough fast as fuck punk/metal to tide you over until the apocalypse or next years release and tour.

2003 was the year that Satan belched these bad boys out on an unsuspecting world all looking for a fix of Motorhead, Venom and Tank fuelled noise. Filthy, belligerent and obnoxious, Midnight makes music to start fights to and drink beer until you can’t physically carry on its slayer for scum. Athenar has been calling the shots for this ungodly racket, and ‘Hellish Expectations’ won’t disappoint – there are no curveballs, no letdown and plenty of life-affirming noise.

‘Hellish Expectations’ is blunt force trauma set to music – no nonsense, no mucking about just pure fuckin’ hell and some. Imagine all the previous albums thus far rolled into one concise record – Ten songs equally noisy and all as intense and rapid as the last.

Athenar alleges these songs were all written in a weekend after being pissed at the demos of the last album ‘Let There Be Witchery’ (Don’t be hard on yourself mate that album was a belter). Opening track ‘Expect Total Hell’ (Obviously, what else would we expect?) not so much creeps out of the speakers but builds up a head of steam sounding so raw and vital you can feel the head on your back as the chopper your on spews out of the ground as you burst out of Hell. The first thing you notice is how live it all sounds it has the feel of a one take deal and the energy is spot on. The song titles have long since had me properly laughing out loud and ‘Gash Scrape’ is no exception as Cronos must be looking over his shoulder upon his blackest stallion wondering how Venom at their peak never sounded so fuckin’ vital. As you get comfortable ‘Masked And Deadly’ has already been and gone before the old school ‘Slave Of The Blade’ has you windmilling in a pool of sweat.

Side two is underway with ‘Nuclear Savior’ is going through the gears and we’re just warming up never mind a tipper sticker this should carry a government health warning. It’s brutal, raw and insanely addictive like fentinal audio crack.

My heart pacemaker was put out of sync after the last tour and almost caved in my chest so loud was the PA I’m now turning this bad boy past 11 on the stereo as ‘Mercyless Slaughtor’ grinds my ears into submission before ‘Doom Death Desire’ has the Lemmy like a wall of noise hit me like dropping a breezeblock off a ten story building onto my chest but wait, there no time left except to thrash like fuck as ‘F.O.A.L’ races to the finish line and we’re done. It’s not long enough, clocking in at a ‘Reigning Blood’ length album. I mean one song on Venoms ‘At War With Satan’ is almost the length of the entire ‘Hellish Expectations’ album some will complain but I accept it for what it is pure fuckin armageddon in a nutshell and besides the music is top fuckin notch, that’s a given the artwork has two pencil drawn demon women with 70s bushes and a nun swinging from a Bell Midnight at truly Satanic Royalty and have to accept their place at the top of the Black heavy metal/punk ranking. They have no peers and as well as being in a league with Satan nobody can touch them. Vital album right here, buy and F.O.A.L. because you’re worth it.

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