Pestilence - "Hadeon"

Bassist / vocalist Patrick Mameli is carrying the torch for this band that dates all the way back to 1986. Even with all of the new blood this takes you back to the early days of death metal when it met at the intersection of thrash. The riffs wind around themselves, the snarl of the vocals is the only thing that keeps this anchored in death metal on a song like "Manifestations". Mameli obviously takes most of the song writing credit here as the tightly palm muted guitar takes you back to the golden years of bands like Bolt Thrower and Sepultura. The bulk of the technical death metal bands pretty much owe the bulk of their careers to these guys who were doing this kind of thing before Death went into this direction. The experience is certainly felt in the song writing which balances keeping the uncompromising  aggression with catchy riffs .

Four songs in and I am pretty fucking impressed. I mean if you have been doing this shit since 1986, then you should be skilled, I think the catch is being able to keep the flame going for this kind of metal. Another way the old school metal breeding of this project wins out is the fact that the songs are all under five minutes. They manage to cover a ton of ground in this time frame even including weird angular robotic interludes on "Astral Projection". The atmosphere added to the songs keeps things interesting, they prove they can shred as needed. "Dis-incarnate Entity" goes into a riff with an almost Morbid Angel like groove. Keeping with the 80's there is a great thrash like bass tone that brings bands like Anthrax and Overkill to mind in the way the pick attacks the strings. The riffs are taunt and in the pocket to make it hard not to head bang to. This is where they get it right and modern tech-death fails.

"Ultra-Demons" is pretty straight forward and aggressive with the production on the vocals making the difference. The robotic effects return. The guitar solos have enough flash and class to make them work and the more proggy time changes work and don't lose the momentum. They don't lose me when the pace picks up which is where many bands fall off. I think they have written songs that hooked me in more than "Layers of Reality". They use a similar rushed speed on "Electro Magnetic" that employs sparse blast beats as accents. Overall this album won me over and if this is any indication 2018 might be a good year for death metal I'll round this up to a 9. This album comes out March 5th.

Exhumed : "Death Revenge"

So I dipped into this album because I was reviewing a pop punk album and it was getting to be too much for me and needed a breather. So I bean alternating back and forth between the two albums. They could be at any further ends of the spectrum that is for sure. These guys are machine like in there approach to old school death metal. Matt Harvey is the only original member in the band. A couple of the guys do go back to 96 , so they have paid some dues. They consider themselves gore grind. They are less punk influenced than say Ghoul. Typically this sort of thing is a little too straight forward for me and not dark enough, but the do have some catchy riffs. They only bore me with blunt force on "Dead End" . It is obvious they came out of the more Exodus end of the thrash days. Death metal grew out of this more than "Scream Bloody Gore".

If you have any doubts about death metal's thrash beginnings then check out that Slayer riff in "Night Work". It all comes together really solidly. This is the first song that hooks me in all the way.The moshy riff midway into "Unspeakable" makes it more interesting than, "the Harrowing". Then the need for speed begins to mire them down a little and the monochrome emotional range of this genre sets in. All the songs are of course about death. It's when they are finding the more Slayer like grooves that the band is allowed to fully function to the best of their ability and I do not mind the dive bomb Slayer worship of the guitar solo's since Slayer doesn't sound like Slayer anymore. The symphonic interludes are not a real ground breaking distraction from the meat of the metal. I think when the guitar echoes the melody of the strings however it is more effective.

The vocals on this album are a trade off of deep gurgled growls and higher more snarling rasps that are sightly Obituary like in their exclamatory phrasing .One of the album's most impressive moments it the instrumental 'the Anatomy Act of  1832".  It's not an interlude , but a fully fleshed song that keeps your attention throughout.  The bass tone has a thrash like picked rumble when it does become audible, but the main stage spot light of this and most death metal is the guitar and drums. The double bass is pretty smoking and the guitar are mean enough sounding to get the job done , but largely keep the tone planted firmly in 1998. There are some sections of guitar harmonies that find them in melo-death for a verse here and they are largely committed to being brutal.So if you want 90s flavored death metal and are too young to have caught it the first time around then this will seem very fresh. If you just want aggression out of your death metal, these guys have that I'll give it a 7.5, it's a solid album, when I want to hear this sort of things I'll go with something from that time period I am more drawn to like Deicide.

Gruesome :" Dimensions of Horror"

This band was spawned after being a touring Death tribute band, as both Matt Harvey and drummer Gus Rios, played on the Death to All tour. So this sounds like a mix of the first two Death albums. The first song brings a sense of nostalgia, but how long this tribute can keep me engaged is another question.  Sure I like the first two Death albums, but why not just download them? In my teen days I remember several locals bands sounding like this so Death influence in death metal is nothing new. The other side of the coin is these guys are fucking good at  re-creating this. So if you are a super crazed Death fan or too young to have caught Chuck and the Boys back in the day then this makes a little more sense. By the time I get to "Amputation" it's wearing on me a little. There are some cool riffs mixed in, but the rule here is cool riffs alone don't make good songs.  I think it's a good thing there are only six songs , because this would be very tiring if there were twelve.

They bgin to pull the plug on "Hellbound" and inject more groove and songwriting into things , making this the album's high point. The opening riff to "Dimensions of Horror" feels like the are leaning in a more Spiritual Healing Direction" the dirty things up on the verse.The less than two and a half minute "Seven Doors" is pretty straight forward death metal and even when Death did it struck me more as filler rather than having any real musical weight on it's own accord . Lyrically growling about zombies could not bore me any more.The title track's  opening riff feels like thet are leaning in a more Spiritual Healing Direction" the dirty things up on the verse. They go back into the "Pull the Plug" type groove on this one, but it's so good it's hard to complain. I'll give this album a 7 as it hardly has an original moment, though I think that's the point. It's well played so Death fans only who are needing a fix or the screams of bloody gore.

Nocturnus:"the Science of Horror"

Who cares if these are just unearthed demos, they are going to be better than most of the shit out there. Reason being...Mike Browning was one of the founding members of Morbid Angel and " the Key" is a fucking classic death metal album, and one of the first to use keyboards prominently. The later part of this album goes back to 1987 before they included the keys. This is raw as most black metal, but has a strong thrash current running through it's veins. Guitar solos blowing your mind at every turn. Some of the chugs on here are just tough as hell. There is no way you can not head bang to this. This band separates the men from the poseurs. In 1992  after recording the "Thresholds album, Browning was fired from the band he created, so this chronicles the path to "the Key".

For a demo the vocals sound great on  the first version of "Before Christ After Death." The effects give almost a Voi Vod feel to them and the call and response on the chorus is just great classic metal."Standing In Blood" is the first song on here where the keys really reach out and grab you. The accent the punches perfectly. This creates a more progressive element than the band is commonly remembered for. These songs are raw and ravaging, a clear stepping stone to the sound they achieved on the Key.This rawness translates well on songs like "Undead Journey"which carries an unearthly chug. Jeff Estes proves he is the most under rated bassist in death metal.

Things get even more primitive on the demos that follow as it spotlights the days before the band included keyboards. You can hear Morbid Angel's root woven into this. The sound quality at time really makes these diamonds in the rough. But if you are a tape collecting hipster who likes stuff to sound like this anyway, then here you go. These demos began circulating as tapes in the back of magazines like Metal Maniacs. The early lines between thrash and death metal are just being drawn on "b.c.-a.d." The rasp to Browning's vocals is not too far removed from the hateful rasp some black metal singers take on.

"the Entity" shows the band's dynamic range even without the aid of keyboard. They slow build the songs into a crazed outburst of rabid blast beats, long before there was any hunger in Transylvania. The Slayer influence can be heard on "Unholy Fury". The kind of meth propelled drumming that earned the moniker speed metal, threatens to tear the ragged kit apart. The rough charm of this collection, might just put the taste in my mouth for "the Key", which is a perfectly fine option, as it is an album that deserves going back and re-experiencing. Since this is a compilation, I won't score it , but the Key is a ten.

Cannibal Corpse : "A Skeletal Domain"

It's easy to  think these guys came from Tampa with all the other death metal bands from this era of the 80's , but these guys were from New York.They are a band whose name has to come to mind when you think of death metal. This is their 13th album, so they have a good grasp on what they are doing .If you are like me and latched onto the Chris Barnes years, never giving  Corpsegrinder  a chance , despite his being the inspiration for Nathan Explosion, then the numbers do the talking as Barnes only has four albums with the band vs George's 9.... so he is Cannibal Corpse. His approach here remains  is very straight forward , he relies on using punching phrasing to fist fuck your corpse.

Lyrically you know what you are getting here, it doesn't sound like they are getting as vile as the Tomb of the Mutilated. Production is a problem that seems to have been solved for them over the years.The drums don't have that flat snare sound that used to plague the earlier albums. Right out of the gate the crisp guitars are in your face solos and all. The bass is very audible and rumbles in a manner similar to old Deicide.

The songs do begin to sound the same by "Sadistic Embodiment" though the accents hit you from another angle. "Kill or Become" also sets it self apart before going into more of blast that returns to a groove. The chant of "fire up the chainsaw. Has a nice gore shout out to horror movies that certainly fits going into October.

These songs are all pretty fast wham blam defile you mam in length, with the five minute "The Murderer's Pact" as the album's most sprawling. The title track posses one of the album's most powerful chugs. This album is pretty brutal, but if you moved on to darker rawer death metal like the whole Incantation school death metal, this might come across as mall metal to you. Some of the more straight forward moments like 'Headlong into Carnage" don't do much for me despite the flawlessness of the execution.

The velocity of "Murder's Pact" gets my attention. Then it loses me when it seems they are taking the easy way out, but I have to remember these guys are like Ac/Dc and Motorhead in that regard.It just begins to boil down to not all chugs are created equal, it's the ones that really lock on here that make or break these songs. Sure there are solos that are surprisingly tasteful in the Deathklock sort of way.With that said the chugs on "Funeral Cremation" are pretty rewarding. "Vector of Cruelty" is also pretty solid and stands out from the pack."Bloodstained Cement" digs its feet into the chug pretty heavily as well. The Slayer influence on the genre peeks out slightly on " Asphyxiate to Resuscitate"  The closer "Hallowed Bodies" pretty much sums the album up with the fury of it's chug.

This album is pretty solid as far as straight forward death metal goes, the songwriting has matured and I think I am finally ready to pass the mantle over to George now ,as it sounds as if he is worthy. I am going to give this album an 8, but if you are a fan of the band then this is obviously what you want so round it up to a 9.

 

Domains : "Sinister Ceremonies"

After making a few best of the year so far lists I decided to check these guys out.It pretty straight up death metal right at the speed demonic nature of the double bass and the mean riffs that still retain hooks to them.This Spanish Death metal band has been around since 2005 , but this is their first full length. They have used the 9 years wisely to perfect their craft , though their former drummer is now the guitarist.

This is somewhere between Morbid Angel and Incantation.The opener does what most metal openers do and kicks the door down. The punchy follow up is "Mastery". The vocal delivery reminds me of old pre-Beneath the Remains, Sepultura. It's a lower to mid range rasp. The use of soloing helps to establish more melodic elements in a otherwise straight forward riff barrage. Not as grinding as some death metal it holds a certain 90's groove.

There is a more dramatic horror movie spookiness to the riff opening "Through Infernal Damnation". There are elements here that remind me of Vader. These guys are trying to write actual songs and not just get away with being as heavy as possible.There is an almost rabid feeling at the onset of "Raped By Darkness". The effects that coat the vocals arrival keep it evil. The more doom laden stomp that brings the song to an end is pretty tough stuff.

They spent the first half of the album using restraint when it comes to speed and some of that is sacrificed on "Eucharist of Relevance". They make for this with the excellently crafted riff to "Crowned At Dusk". It carries an almost Dissection type of darkness to it.
"Towards Pleroma" is the title track from their 2009 demo. It is a rawer song, but still has a good catchy melodic section. I can see why fans of old school death metal are going bat shit for this, but then again metal heads that get stuck in certain era's will over look originality. They nail the old death metal guitar tone , but their is a fuzziness to it that could stand to catch up with the times in terms of heft production wise.They start to slow things down at the beginning of "Labyrinth of Incense" , but can't resist the urge for long to jack the double bass up and often it resembles something closer to black metal than any of the other songs on this album, as well as offers a wider dynamic range of sounds.They creep around with some slower more moody sections. They close things out with the title track that holds up the heaviness established earlier on the album, soemtimes creating a more Bathory like epic , that is when Bathory goes for the most straightforward approach devoid of any folk elements.Early Death can also be heard hear , like from Scream Bloody Gore era. I'll give this one a 8.5 ,as it is well written and played, so I guess the big deal with this album is that most death metal trying to capture this sort of thing is not very well written?