If you think old school thrash metal is mainly an 80’s thing, don’t judge too quickly. Nowadays old school thrash albums are still released, one of them by the Italian Planar Evil. Founded in 2000, they recorded their first demo in 2002, called Land of Doom. Now, in 2009, and many live shows later, they’ve released their debut album Mankind Way of Life. Let’s see if these fellas know how to bring it down!

You can say this record can be split into two parts: the first six tracks are new, the last five are renewed versions of tracks from Land of Doom, neatly announced by a second intro. What you get from this are 10 songs of straight old school thrash metal, nothing more and nothing less. The album has a good sound quality, and if you wait about six minutes after the end of the last song, you discover a little surprise, as in some weird guy trying to utter some English words. Funny for the first time you hear it, but nothing special.

As for the music, associations with bands like Tankard and older Exodus are inevitable, and if you like their music you’ll probably like Planar Evil as well. For the rest Mankind Way of Life sounds just like you’d expect from an old school thrash metal album. The songs are fun but not specifically outstanding, they don’t really stick in the memory after listening to them. To me the only song having this effect is 'Only Crimes', due to some nice guitar licks. Though, it's too bad that lead guitarist Antonio seems to be lacking inspiration for his solos most of the time. 

I’d say try this album out only if you’re a real fan of the genre, otherwise Mankind Way of Life is just not interesting enough.