Bloodgasm

Brutal.

That's the first thing that went through my mind as the final track, an extreme cover of Sabbath's "Into the Void" came to its brutal conclusion. I sat, stunned at the sheer power that emnated from the amazing death metal record that had me stomping around my living room just moments before.

The album opens with "Invoke the Suffering", which itself begins with a sample, which are littered generously (a little too generously, with some taking up a third of the song) about the record. Guitars on the album are very prominent, and remind me of early Cannibal Corpse. In fact, the entire album is reminiscient of CC in many ways. The guitar tone, rather than being thin and trebly, is huge and bassy. This isn't the most technical album ever, but it makes up for it by giving the guitars space in the record. The fact that it isn't constant shredding is probably the most enjoyable part of the guitars. The guitar sounds range from brutal distortion ("Peeled Like a Pig") to bizarre wah and phased ("Clandestine from Humanity").

The bass on "Bloodgasm" is actually audible! Upon first listen, it sounds like the bassist is AWOL, but listening a little closer reveals the bass actually seems to add to the guitar sound, while still being audible. The raging bottom end of the guitar seems to be made even bigger by the bass.

Drumming on this album is rather varied. It does have the typical blast beats, but it often suprises with almost progressive late-snare beats, but the drumming is everything you'd want in a DM record. My only complaint was the snare sound, which sounded a little too tight and high pitched.

The vocals are what rounds out this record. The vocalist has a very "Corpsegrinder"-esque sound, but also incorporates his own styles that you wouldn't necessarily hear from the famous Cannibal Corpse frontman. Guttural growls and piercing screams sometimes remind me a little too much of CC, and I wish the vocalist would use his powerful midrange growl more.

Lyrics are run-of-the mill gore or heathen most of the time, but they satisfy nonetheless.

Overall, this is a great death metal record. The samples add a lot to the experience, although they could have cut them a little shorter (the ones on "Clandestine" and "Loss of Divinity" take up at least a quarter of the songs). It isn't ubertechnical like Origin, nor is it pathetically boring like Waking the Cadaver. Grinds corpses from beginning to end.


Standout Tracks: "Clandestine from Humanity", "Humiliate the Holy", "Loss of Divinity", "Peeled Like a Pig", "Into the Void (Labeled as Bonus Track)".

Recommended to: Fans of Cannibal Corpse, Six Feet Under, and general death metal fans who don't want all the riffs to be boring shredfests.

Whoa. I was a little caught off guard the first I listened to this album. Totally not what I was expected. I was expecting was another Devourment-wannabe cloneband with a minimal amount of interesting riffs, stupid vocals, and run-of-the-mill gore song titles. Well, I was pleasantly surprised with this band! This band aren't the most technical of musicians, but they sure know how to make the songs flow nicely together. They use a lot of samples, the samples set the general mood for the songs. My favourite song from the album is "Invoke the Suffering" even though it has a very familiar sample at the beginning, after the vocalist comes in and shouts "Invoke the Suffering!" and you hear slam riffs coming in, you know it's a killer album. Another noteworthy track is "Peeled Like A Pig" which features the famous "Lick my plate, you dogdick" soundclip, also used by Broken Hope. Another fact that I should pointed out is that this band uses slam riffs very appropriately, not slam-on-top-of-slam-wannabe. A very good thing is that this band sticks to their own formula, adding some solos in. The album has a very hyper, almost hardcore-like energy to it. The verdict is killer slams, great dual vocals, lots of energy, and shredding solos. Good album, and I hope to hear more from this band in the future!