{"id":527364,"date":"2026-03-08T19:50:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-08T19:50:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/527364\/"},"modified":"2026-03-08T19:50:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-08T19:50:08","slug":"borrower-killerdemons-review-angry-metal-guy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/527364\/","title":{"rendered":"Borrower – Killerdemons Review | Angry Metal Guy"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Unlike some of our staff<\/a>, I\u2019ve never been in a band. However, I can imagine the feeling of satisfaction in putting together and releasing that first full-length record. For every band that achieves this milestone, countless more never do. Italy\u2019s Borrower was nearly among that number. Formed in 1993, Borrower released three demos in the \u201990s, a fourth in 2005, and then disappeared until 2018 with their debut EP. Whatever interrupted their musical career, the dream remained, and they finally released their first album (and signed to a label, to boot) 33 years later with their founding vocalist, Massano Ratano, and drummer, Frank Formoso, joined by new guitarists Matteo Marzo and Matteo Marini. Behold their vision, a story of killer, humanoid demons as told through music that harks back to some of the legends of \u201980s and \u201990s speed metal.<\/p>\n

Granted, the concept of an album where each song tells a story about a distinctive demonic entity with its own unique \u201cphysical traits\u201d and \u201cspecific weapon\u201d is extremely silly, yet Killerdemons proves to be a catchy and cool affair. Borrower claim Mot\u00f6rhead, Judas Priest, and Dio as their main influences, and they write spare, riff-tastic tunes in their honor. The guitars carry much more heft than their influences, however, with enough reverb to take tunes dangerously close to stoner territory a l\u00e1 High on Fire and Black Sabbath. This marriage between speed and stoner proves effective. \u201cEl Degollador\u201d oscillates between lightning-fast, \u201cAce of Spades\u201d-inspired riffs and slower, \u201cWar Pigs\u201d-style stoner riffs in a performance that\u2019s sure to give you whiplash. Taking a cue from AC\/DC, Borrower keeps their song structures simple yet catchy. The rollicking \u201cStay Alive\u201d best demonstrates this virtue with crisp songwriting and energetic pacing. Each track has distinctive riffs that are far more powerful than the demons it conjures.<\/p>\n

In the eight years since their 2018 EP, A Plague Chapter\u2026, Borrower has vastly improved their sound and instrumental prowess. The two Matteos have played a major role in this transformation. Marini\u2019s fuzzy guitar tone adds heft where the EP\u2019s guitars sounded tinny. His blending of Mot\u00f6rhead-style riffcrafting with the density of High on Fire and Mastodon adds an extra oomph to tracks like \u201cDer Todessoldat\u201d and \u201cTough Fight.\u201d Marzo\u2019s bass takes a commanding presence as well. He adds depth and backbone to the music, making his presence especially felt on the slower moments of \u201cKnocking on the Coffins.\u201d Formoso takes a restrained approach behind the kit, occasionally blasting the cymbals (\u201cDream on Fire\u201d), but mostly setting the pace with an effective simplicity. The wild card of the group is vocalist Ratano. He seemingly channels Lemmy, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Fozzie Bear in a truly strange, yet somehow endearing performance. His Italian accent, which drags out the words \u201ckee-ler dee-mons\u201d during the chorus of \u201cKillerdemons,\u201d adds a level of camp that contributes to the goofy fun.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

While Borrower keeps Killerdemons to a concise 36 minutes, the record does falter on the two songs that stray from the 3-4 minute range. The first, \u201cKnocking on the Coffins,\u201d has some memorable riffs, including a cool, old school solo, but at over five minutes, it drags on a bit too long. Positioned between the album\u2019s two best tracks, it also proves to be a major momentum killer. The biggest sore thumb, however, is the six-plus minute finale, \u201cA Chaos Vortex.\u201d Not only does it lack memorable riffs, but it falters in its final two minutes as the band sorely misjudges when to best wrap it up. Trimming 2-3 minutes from each of these songs would have immensely improved the album\u2019s otherwise incredible pacing.<\/p>\n

As I established last month<\/a>, metal tends to invite some weird characters, and the killer demon universe created here is certainly an odd one. But that\u2019s also what makes metal so much fun. Bands feel free to try out their off-the-wall ideas, from literary<\/a>\u2013 or video game<\/a>-inspired themes to the creation of fantasy<\/a> or sci-fi<\/a> realms. And sometimes these ideas actually work. Borrower finally sees through their vision, or at least the start of it, and presents it in such a catchy, cool way. I love to see original ideas performed with such care and passion, and I hope these guys continue to cultivate their ideas and musical talents.<\/p>\n

\ufeff<\/p>\n

Rating: 3.0\/5.0
DR: 6 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Argonauta Records<\/a>
Website: Bandcamp<\/a> | Facebook<\/a> | Official Site<\/a>
Releases Worldwide: February 13th, 2026<\/p>\n

\n\tGive in to Your Anger:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Unlike some of our staff, I\u2019ve never been in a band. However, I can imagine the feeling of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":527365,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[10968,10612,81432,262233,64,63,6814,262234,262235,134,239642,20177,10616,41342,41343,262236,37988,152973,136,228,229,152975,10622],"class_list":{"0":"post-527364","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-10968","9":"tag-3-0","10":"tag-ac-dc","11":"tag-argonauta-records","12":"tag-au","13":"tag-australia","14":"tag-black-sabbath","15":"tag-borrower","16":"tag-dio","17":"tag-entertainment","18":"tag-feb26","19":"tag-heavy-metal","20":"tag-high-on-fire","21":"tag-italian-metal","22":"tag-judas-priest","23":"tag-killerdemons","24":"tag-mastodon","25":"tag-motorhead","26":"tag-music","27":"tag-review","28":"tag-reviews","29":"tag-speed-metal","30":"tag-stoner-metal"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/527364","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=527364"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/527364\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/527365"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=527364"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=527364"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=527364"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}