Death is June - Looking Back in Anger at Incantation : " Onward to Galgotha"

Perhaps classic death metal is more guilty of this than any other genre except perhaps black metal as it hit you so hard at the time going to listen back without the nostalgia for the actual songs can be revealing. So here is an album I have even always regarded as a classic without giving it in recent years enough listens to justify this claim so we are going revist it. They are full blast ahead with the unearthly low growls soaked in reverb to further their sub demonic nature. This album came out in 1992, so Morbid Angel was already way ahead of the game. These guys were at the altars of madness while Trey and the boys has already moved onto more mainstream appeal. They stay pretty dense through out this album. There are moments when you get to breath in the stench of the grave they are digging. The beginning of "Rotting Spiritual Embodiment" being not only one of them , but also the birth of what went on to be called death doom as the elements of both genres came together. When this album came out I thought this was just death metal and thought of doom as Candlemass and St. Vitus.

 For the early 90s this album still sounds good and not dated at all. Their grasp of guitar solos was very Trey influenced here.The hit you with a more punishing darkness in the depths of "Unholy Massacre' , however the more blast beatend parts do not hold up as well. We are not asking if this is just a good death metal album we are asking if it is indeed the classic we have held it to be. The unrelenting speed lashes back on "Entrantment of Evil". What this album did for death metal was distance itself from the ties to it's thrash roots with the Slayer influence only on the guitar solos. The more doom like moments did put some space between them and their peers. Even when these guys really plow into the speed, they can become a blur and sacrifice some of the song. However, their strength is the ability to shift a riffs in it's track and keep things interesting.

This is one of the heaviest albums made without a doubt. You cannot take that away from them. It is very dark. The double bass is monstrous and the guitar tone right from hell. The somewhat surreal nature of the cover art signal something different was happening here, even amid the hurried blast beats. I will give this one a 9 as when it comes to songs, this might not even be their best album, it still broke ground when it was released/.