While the name Yyrkoon made me frown slightly, it was the strange cover artwork and the band’s home country, France, which definitely sparked my curiosity. Although somehow the whole concept of the artwork and the band’s name led me to believe that I would get to hear symphonic black metal, I quickly found out (a pleasant surprise I might add) that Yyrkoon actually predominantly plays thrash metal, and how!

Dying Sun is an album that contains 10 thrash metal songs that feature minor death and black metal influences. The music tends mainly towards American thrash metal but Yyrkoon has managed to retain their own sound mostly through the integration of European death trash metal elements (although I have to admit that once in awhile a certain riff sounds strangely familiar).

There’s a good balance between aggression and melody and this balance is not only limited to the guitar work; Yyrkoon combines clean vocals (in the choruses) and thrash screams in a refreshing mixture.

Yyrkoon is just a talented band. The guitar work is technical, the solos are good, the songs offer enough variety and the production is just as clean as a whistle. While the aggressive “Thrash ‘Em All” reminds of Testament’s brutal “Dog Faced Gods”, the fast and melodic “Stolen Souls” is just a pure classic and easily the best song of the album. I can recommend this album to anyone who is into modern thrash metal. My only real complaint: the album should have been 5 to 10 minutes longer! 40 minutes is acceptable but nevertheless slightly short.