Ungentle Exhumation

Things kick off with "Gravaged (A Cryptopsy)", an absolutely classic tune in every way, especially for Cryptopsy who can strike me as being a bit unmemorable at times. "Abigor" seems to be some sort of eco-Death Metal. No it, doesn't sound like Gojira, but it is seems to have been made entirely from recycled parts. Nice of Cryptopsy to be so caring and trying to help save the Polar Bears. "Back To The Worms" is something a bit different with more slower riffs, and, of course, THAT chugging chorus riff which i love. "Mutant Christ" is also a good song but nowhere near as good as Gravaged or Abigor. It seems quite similar to Gravaged or any of the other songs, but less as effective the second/third/fourth time round. It is a good song though and Worm's scream about a minute and a half in is just inhumane. Should people be able to do that without some sort of carpentry tool being used on them? No.

The style of this demo is easily summed up. This is certainly nowhere near as technical as, say, Once Was Not or even None So Vile, but it's still quite technically proficient. It robs heavily from the grave of Carcass, and then injects with a vile mix of Entombed, Suffocation and Cannibal Corpse. It has the old school riffs present on Left hand Path, and the chugging riffs, the boingy bass and the artillery style drums of CC, mixed with the insane drum fills of Suffocation.

The riffs are top-notch death metal riffs, that just make you want to headbang, which you CAN headbang to. This isn't overly-complicated, 999999bpm shredding insanity which changes time-signature every three seconds and is laden with flamenco solos. The bass is good, but as always with pretty much every Metal album I review, I can't comment much on it, it mostly apes the Guitars, but the little mini-bass solos are good. Lord Worm's vocals are unbelievable, his high pitched screams sound out of this world and the growls are AMAZING. But that's about it really. He is very monotone and grates quickly, by the second or third song. It seems he's mastered two voices to their extreme, and has developed a comfort zone. he seems unwilling to try anything new. This is proven even more when we look at Once Was Not, 12 years later, and see he's still doing the same vocals, although a tad less effective. It's a shame as he has great potential to unleash a torrent of odd and strange voices but won't, and it seems too late, now that he's been kicked out of Cryptopsy and has suffered health problems as of late. Such a waste of potential.

Speaking of potential, this brings us nicely onto the drums. They're utterly fantastic, possibly the greatest drum performance by Flo on any album and definitely my favourite by a mile. "WHAAAAAAAAT?" I hear you cry, "BUT THEY'RE SO UNTECHNICAL, HE PLAYS SIMPLE BEATS AT SPEEDS WHICH AREN'T FAST BY CRYPTOPSY STANDARDS!!!!!!1". And that's my point. One of the downsides about Cryptopsy for me has always been the drums. Technically, Flo is one of the greatest and fastest drummers in the world, but musically, he bores the shit out of me. There's so many times I can listen to the "DUNDUNDUNDUNDUNDUNDUNDUNDUNDUNDUNDUNDUNDUNDUNDUN" of most Cryptopsy songs, before it shits me to tears. It's all too "showy-offy" for my liking and Flo seems to be a bit of an arrogant prick, demanding that he be the centre-point of the band and over producing his drums and making waaaaay too high in the mix. I always found the best parts of Cryptopsy songs was when Flo laid back a bit and played less technical but more audible drum beats. Maybe I'm just a boring git who prefers simplicity over 64th notes on the double bass but hey ho, it's my opinion, you can't stop me. However, as I mentioned before, Flo Mounier likes to put his drums waaay too high in the mix and this is still true on this demo. But the production is a good one. Flo hasn't taken the drum presence to extremes and drowned out everything else, like on most Cryptopsy records, and every instrument is perfectly audible and grabs your attention. In fact, if I didn't know beforehand, I'd be hard pressed to say this was a demo recording. It's an astonishingly good production for a first demo.

In summary, this demo is a valuable piece of Cryptopsy's history, a time when they were just getting to grips with their technicality and harnessing it. It effortlessly provides a bridge between old school death metal and the ultra-techincal "new school" of the late 90s/2000s, as well as showing us Cryptopsy at grassroots level, still leasing a lot of elements from traditional death metal. Yes, it can be feel a bit samey (Especially Lord Worm's vocals) and you'll feel like you've heard it before a million times, but all of the songs are solid and memorable death metal songs and would be welcome in any Cryptopsy setlist. The demo is the perfect length, in my opinion, because although there might start to be a lingering sense that it's all a bit identikit, the demo finishes before you can get angered by it. There is no filler and it doesn't drag on. If this had been any longer I'd probably give it a lower rating than I am but I love all four of these songs, they are amazing. Also, the fact Flo actually plays competent beats that most Death Metal drummers could play, and a production which betrays it's demo status is just amazing.

This has to be my favourite Cryptopsy release, ahead of Once Was Not, where the technicality and progression actually worked, and None So Vile. All of the songs on this are far better than their reworked versions on Blasphemy Made Flesh and ...And Then You'll Beg. If you are looking for sheer mind-bending fastness and insane solos, then avoid this like the plague and go buy something by Kataklysm or Necrophagist. But if you're looking for a solid release, with some amazing tunes on it that won't bore you to tears and is just a little bit more traditional and old-school then get this now, you won't regret it.

When reaching back into metal history, particularly the extreme genres, it is easy to lose one’s sense of perspective and trash things that had a level of influence on what guises as extreme music nowadays. For someone who has a particular dislike for the recent phenomenon of deathcore, a metal sub-genre that has some sense of a commonality with technical/progressive death metal, the temptation to go after some of the forefathers of extreme music meshed with technical showboating in their early years is strong. And let’s be perfectly clear, the only real difference between Cryptopsy’s early blend of technical and brutal death metal and deathcore is the level of technical exaggeration and further incorporation of grindcore, though hints of Carcass’ brand of goregrind can be found in this band’s earliest works, not to mention most other brutal acts.

For a death metal demo, this is actually a pretty well realized hybrid of Suffocation’s brand of brutality and a helping of Napalm Death’s grindcore sensibilities, with the notable exception of the drums. It seems that Flo Mounier was possibly listening to Soundgarden heavily when he came up with the snare sound on here, which has garbage can lid noise written all over it. Add to this that the drums are turned up too loud and you have about 20% of the thunder that should be exhibited by the guitar stolen. The overall execution of the beats, by contrast, are executed flawlessly. Apparently at this point in extreme metal’s history it was also expected for the tempo and beat transitions to have some sense of coherence, let alone the rest of the instrumentation, and it shows throughout each song.

This sense of organization is mirrored throughout the rest of the arrangement, although the only other musician on here exuding any sense of technical virtuosity is Lord Worm. His mostly guttural grunts are sort of a middle ground between Chris Barnes’ (Cannibal Corpse) ghoulish vocalizations and John Paoline’s (Mortal Decay) demonic belches. Occasionally, like Paoline, he’ll work in some ridiculously exaggerated shrieks that almost sound like a woman screaming while being cut in half, most notably at the beginning of “Gravaged (A Crytopsy)”. Unfortunately his style doesn’t really reflect the versatile characteristics of the overall death metal genre as say a David Vincent or Chuck Schuldiner would, resulting in an all brutal, all the time approach that works well for a four song demo, but gets tiresome and after a while even comical on a full length album.

As far as the rest of the line-up goes, the approach is relatively repetitive and safe, though not without its occasional fits of brilliance. Although mostly built on either a fairly dry low end groove or repetitive tremolo picked atonal drones, there is one solid riff that jumps out of nowhere at around the 1:28 mark of “Mutant Christ”. Most of the release goes through this same sort of dual Morbid Angel and Cannibal Corpse worship that tends to meander a little before deciding to get going, but “Abigor” stands out as the most consistent ass kicker guitar wise, complete with a respectably executed guitar solo and some nice metallic sounding bass additives. Mostly the bass functions as the mediator of the band, as the drums mostly seek to battle the vocals for prominence and occasionally eat away at what status the guitar tires desperately to maintain in the mix.

Although the drumming clearly displays a vast level of technical prowess, there isn’t really much separating the technique shown on here from most of the founders of the death genre and the various brutal acts drawing influence from Cannibal Corpse, so applying the label technical death metal to this particular release is a bit unnecessary and perhaps misleading. It is definitely an adequate and enjoyable display of competence that carries all the gore ridden lyrical trappings of the brutal death style, though that label is redundant as there is hardly a band in the genre that doesn’t have a sense of brutality to their sound. If you like early Carcass with a bit more chops and an extremely exaggerated vocal style, this will listen well.

Later submitted to (www.metal-observer.com) on January 6, 2009.

Back in the early 90s, one of death metal's future leaders would be conceived in Quebec, Canada by some aspiring musicians. Necrosis, later changing their name to Cryptopsy, was this particular band that was one of many superb death metal bands of the era. In 1993, the band released their demo "Ungentle Exhumation", and quickly made a mark on the world wide death metal scene.

What did this demo have to offer? Quite a lot. First of all, the production is surprisingly clear for a demo, and I'd even say it's better recorded than their debut LP. The guitars are thick and full of character, the bass is just audible enough to prove effective... and the drums were some of the most punishing things to be recorded. A young talent known as Flo Mounier was just starting to burst onto the drum world with this demo, and blew everyone's mind with his flair, technicality, and speed. And don't forget the legendary Lord Worm, the man with some of the sickest vocals on earth, also blows everyone's ear drums with this demo.

So, we have extremely competent musicians, and a well recorded demo. But the question is, what were the songs like? It's obvious the songs on here ruled. Furthering the direction that Suffocation started, Cryptopsy took those percussive riffs, and added counterpoint riffs of tremolo picked, violent streams of shifting melodies. Here we have four songs displaying a lot of memorable riffs, blast beats, and lyrics of poetic torture and insanity. Could a death metal fan ask for anything more?

The guitar solos presented on the album are of high caliber, and sound well thought out, with the addition to being well played. These solos create an excellent counter point to the vicious grinding onslaught that exists for the rest of the songs, while still being quite extreme themselves.

The verdict is that this demo is essential for all death metal fans. It's possible to find a reissue on CD, so there really is no excuse not to hear this.