Force Fed on Human Flesh

About 20 years ago, Gorelord popped up on my radar due to its connection to a favorite band of mine, Necrophagia.

What we have here is a fun, heavy, memorable death metal album. Some great riffs show up throughout the entire thing and the overall sound works well for what Frediablo was going for. There are riffs that lean more toward the groove-oriented sound, while others are more straight-ahead death metal riffs. Lyrically, the songs are nothing fancy-- just simple horror fandom stuff, really. There are some obvious comparisons to make here, such as Mortician and Impetigo (including the heavy use of horror movie samples), as well as the aforementioned Necrophagia. Since Frediablo was in Necrophagia during this time, it would be rather hard to avoid even a passing similarity between the two.

Vocally, Frediablo goes with a raspier style, rather than a super-low, rumbly, guttural growl. It is a good contrast to the low nature of the guitars/bass to have that almost black metalish vocal style on the album. This approach also makes him fairly coherent, at least in comparison to many other death metal vocalists.

I mentioned the use of samples earlier. Much like Mortician, Gorelord samples bits of horror movies throughout the album (even using an even longer sample from Lucio Fulci's Quella villa accanto al cimitero than Mortician used from the same scene). There are also some samples from other stuff, such as a sample from Necrophagia's home video release, Through Eyes of the Dead, which features Necrophagia drummer, Wayne Fabra, talking about supporting old school horror movies and not modern horror. A bit of a odd choice, but it reinforces the horror fanatic element of Gorelord.

The song titles and lyrics are pretty over-the-top: "Alive When Fucking the Dead" and "Necrophilic Orgy in Entrails & Cum", for example. Plenty of gruesome, gory fun to be had here, even if it is a bit on the immature side. A lot of it sounds like the sort of lyrics bands write when they are starting out, just getting a kick out of people's shocked reactions to the stuff they are coming up with. This is not a criticism of the lyrics, either. Poetic, meaningful lyrics are nice and all that, but I still enjoy some blunt, almost primitive lyrics about gore, Satan, etc. Simply put, I believe there is plenty of room in the metal world for both types of lyrics.

For the production, it is clear and pretty friggin' heavy. At the same time, it avoids sounding overly polished, which I really think is a common problem with modern metal albums. Basically, it doesn't get in the way by distracting me from the music by either being too noisy or too pretty sounding. That is really how it should be, in my opinion. A good production is one where you don't even think about it when you listen to it. If you start thinking about the production when listening to an album (unless you are an engineer, producer, etc.), there is probably an issue with it.

This is simply an album that keeps me coming back. Not every day or even every month, but certainly after a couple of decades of listening to it, it remains an album I still play from time to time and enjoy, which is pretty significant when considering the hundreds of other albums I have in my collection that I can choose from. If you want some fun, heavy, gruesome death metal, then check this one out.

Death metal bands with ridiculously blunt names aren't always as blunt as they seem. Gorguts, for example, made some highly technical music. Gorelord, or rather, Frediablo, made no attempt to rise above such stereotypes. The listener understands what Cannibal Corpse is about just from reading the name, and the same goes for this oddball side project of a band. There is a singular influence at work here, and that influence is horror movies. Gorelord is not the first band dedicated to the vision of producing the purely-audio form of a horror film. Mortician has a strong case for that title, but Frediablo's project has a major advantage over the progenitors - this album is actually enjoyable.

Unapologetic, straightforward, and simplistic to the core, Force Fed on Human Flesh knows exactly what it is and is proud of it. The record has nothing fancy buried within, hardly anything that could be considered innovative, and no class whatsoever. And yet, it's... good? How can that be possible? It's because Frediablo took the idea behind Mortician and learned how to actually write a riff. It's because he learned how to properly make use of audio samples from films without ruining the album. And, most of all, it's because he keeps it simple.

I mean no offense those involved in writing this record, but all of the songs here could be adequately covered by any reasonably competent band of high school metalheads. The album is outrageously slow by death metal standards. Like a zombie, it moves at a speed no faster than "shamble." At most middling in pace, the album is packed with breakdowns. For a surprising change of pace, all of them are good, even memorable. Also going heavily in the album's favor is its production, which is of surprisingly high quality for a project this obscure. The guitar sound has a truly satisfying crunch, one of best I think I've heard. The bass is clearly audible throughout and anchors the sound in the lower range for the duration of the record. The drums are restrained and do their job, nothing more. Along with the album's strange speed, the vocals also stand out as unusual. Frediablo originates from Norway, and the influence that black metal had on his work is obvious in his vocals.

The movie samples are part of what makes this record memorable, as garish as they always are. As ugly as your average Cannibal Corpse record is, there are never any soundbites portraying people undergoing the acts described in the lyrics. Here, the lyrics are all derived from horror films, so there are samples readily available to use for that precise purpose. Not all of them are great, but they make it completely clear where the band was coming from. Cheap cannibal flicks are what inspired this bizarre work. The one standout sample is the two minute segment from House by the Cemetery in the opening track. Despite that being the longest sample by far on the album and taking up fully half of the track, it's actually a well-chosen and appropriately atmospheric audio clip. I, for one, think it adds a fair bit of value to the album's aesthetics.

Of course, the aesthetics are gross and wouldn't even be considered aesthetics by most people. Too bad. This record does what it's supposed to do, and it does it well. It's heavy, sometimes devastatingly so. It's simple, to the point that it's a refreshing change of pace. It's meant to be good fun, and it definitely is. And it's kinda gross, but that's a good thing in this realm of music. If you want something that's completely different, here it is. It's not going to change your life, though.

This is a good gore album, filled with catchy riffs and amusing lyrics. For being the product of one man, it's diverse and creative enough to listen through in one sitting, even though some of the samples and riffs can get repetative and almost boring. Props to the House by the Cemetary influence has to be given, for it is a great movie and the sample on Dismembered Virgin Limbs fits with the track well. The 2nd half of the album, especially Alive when Fucking the Dead and Maggots Impaled have strange parts to end with. Hell's Kitchen is a superb ending track idea, being the longest track it can display an overview of the band's sound, which it does well. The album ends with a buzzing of what I assume is flies, and is a fitting end to a Gorelord album with titles like Force Fed on Human Flesh and Chainsaw Ripping Skin. The titles and lyrics were a highlight to me, I love violence.