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Fleshgore > Wake Up for Freedom > Reviews
Fleshgore - Wake Up for Freedom

An album where the filler is killer! - 84%

MikeyC, March 22nd, 2009

Wake up! Hailing from the country that nobody remembers, the Ukraine, is a band called Fleshgore. Never heard of them? I had not heard of them, either, until the release of this, their latest album (semi-hilariously) titled Wake Up For Freedom. Following somewhat in the footsteps of fellow compatriots No Emotions, Fleshgore deliver a brand of aggressive death metal. While not quite as punishing or intimidating as No Emotions, Fleshgore can still deliver the goods with verve and dynamism. What completely separates the two bands, keeping them on each side of the curve, is the amount of filler tracks that are present here. Out of the 11 tracks that Wake Up For Freedom deliver, a grand total of 5 of them would be considered fillers. Quick mathematics would leave us with 6 tracks of death metal left over.

While I can already envision a lot of you grimacing in disgust and disappointment over this fact, I want to assure you that these fillers are in fact a pleasure to listen to. I can’t speak for any of their back catalogue, as I’ve heard none of it at this point in time, but for Wake Up For Freedom, the filler is expertly integrated into the death metal tracks that it barely registers in my ears that they are actually fillers. For any band of any genre to pull that off is quite an achievement, at least to me.

Let’s begin with the death metal tracks. The opener “Manipulations” is a fairly straight-forward slab of mostly mid-paced fury, over enraged growls, “bree”ing throaty squeals, (which I’m not a fan of, but I can tolerate them here), tight drumming with the gravity blast section near the beginning, and a bass guitar that can’t be heard anywhere. This is basically what you’ll hear throughout the album, and that is not necessarily a bad thing.

However, some of the other death metal tracks incorporate some other influences. Best example is the follow-up, “The Way For Freedom”, with its electronic beeping at the start, and the guitars doing some stop/start riffing over it. The beeping returns at 1:15, which accentuates the riff a lot, in my opinion. Expect to hear a lot of interesting riffs and little extras as you push through the album. It keeps it unexpected, and what more could you want in an album? One track in particular must be singled out, and that’s “Never Give Up!”. This is about as close as you can get to a nu-metal song without being completely nu-metal. The breakdown, the “never…never…!” section, the clean vocals and the harsh vocals that appear not to follow the music – it all points to nu-metal for me. However, as the nature of the album is revealed, this is not really abnormal, and I quite like the track.

Speaking of little extras, the filler tracks. They must be mentioned because they are just as important as the death metal tracks that flow around them. The first of the bunch is “Unforgotten Dreams”, which is a small instrumental track beginning with clean guitars. Nothing too special, but it’s alright. Next one is “Forgotten Things” that is much more of an industrial/ambient type filler that sounds cool. The double-up of “Emptiness Of Life” and “Internal Cry Of Soul” begins with clean guitars and ambient drums/sounds over it, then segues into a tribal sort of track with a lot of weird shit mixed in. Both are really good, particularly the second one. Finally it’s “Country #19”, an acoustic guitar piece which I really dig, for one reason or another. Sounds a million miles away from death metal, but I’ll be damned if I didn’t enjoy it. A great closer.

You’re probably wondering how death metal and too much filler can co-exist in harmony together. Well, it would be because of the unconventionality of this band more than likely, and they have some sort of knowledge of what they’re doing – not just putting in a filler for no other reason than to increase track length/total time. It may also be because the filler present is actually killer! Yes, that’s right, the filler tracks take up some credit of the percentage score here. It’s definitely not for everyone, that’s for sure, and I can still see the aforementioned grimacing on some of the hypothetical faces, but for those into some experimental death metal with a bunch of other styles mixed in, then you may find enjoyment out of this. I semi-recommend it, but approach with caution.

Best tracks: The Way For Freedom, Wake Up!, Forgotten Things, Never Give Up!, Country #19