NO RETURN – Psychological Contamination

No Return are an important part of history, that's right, a part of French metal history, they were born over the first half of the Eighties as Evil Power and switched to their current name after one demo released in 1987 and called "First Invasion".

This group — the only remaining member of the original line-up is guitarist Alain Clement — played a fundamental role in spreading death metal in France, together with other acts such as Agressor, Massacra, and the timeless Loudblast. We are taking advantage of this occasion offered by their fellow countrymen at Great Dane Records in order to introduce this classic band to some more people. The label has in fact re-released their first two albums (initially published in 1990 and 1992 via Semetery Records) together as "Psychological Contamination — a title obtained by putting the two original titles "Psychological Torment" and "Contamination" Rises" together. Apart from the remastered two albums, you will also find three songs recorded during a live show in Paris in 2013.

The clear differences in sound and approach between the two albums highlight the path taken by No Return on their extreme metal journey, from the thrash metal roots inspired by the Bay Area scene and names such as Dark Angel and Sepultura, to the more death metal-oriented atmosphere we can hear on the second record. We can see the way they were influenced by Massacre — really popular at the time thanks to the spectacular "From Beyond" — both in terms of music and vocals, as the singer Philippe Ordon used a style quite close to Kam Lee, but in some ways also to Unleashed's Johnny Edlund.

There is a lot to be found in here and there is no lack of classic killers, as we go back to their primal and "thrashy" age (enjoying true gems like "Mutant's March", "Reign Of The Damned", "Degeneration Of The Last Decade", and so on), or just get crushed by their full power with "Damnation", "Civil War" and "Mass Grave". The change of pace in the French band's sound can be appreciated quite easily in this release, while "Trash World" seems to be the only song still connected to their previous style.

This double re-release is a great chance for anyone who loves this genre, and for those who couldn't get the records when they first came out in the Nineties. No Return's true nature wasn't changed during the remastering process, so we can say that "Psychological Contamination" was a successful nostalgic project, you just have to make some room for it in your collection and enjoy.