The Forsaken Mourning of Angelic Anguish

As John took over most of the band’s musical direction and lyrics with Kyle backing him behind the kit, there’s not to say about this release. This time, I ask myself why Craig isn’t still credited as an official member because his session contributions seem significant enough after he supposedly left the band in 1995. But I suppose, hey, whatever. The album cover at least isn’t as messy as the majority of the album covers from the band. I like that simplicity. Yet speaking of simplicity... this EP is quite the one.

Getting the fillers and re-recorded songs out of the way first, they all made no impact on this EP’s overall quality. The 20-second interlude contains Craig’s savaging death growls and sinister guitar harmonics to create a disturbing atmosphere. Didn’t see the point in that. And the longest track is the long outro which is completely pointless. Just a bunch of loud industrial sound effects, to create yet again a disturbing atmosphere.

I don’t really mind the band revising their old material, especially one of their oldies like Blasphemous Creation, but that’s quantity over quality. Re-recording that song again, as well as re-recording three songs from their last album or two, as if the different mixes weren’t enough, you’re already dropping a huge chunk of score for this EP. Blasphemous Creation’s RE-re-recorded version sounds cleaner than the last two versions (those being the second self-titled EP and the first re-recorded version on the debut album). The drums sound itchy, but not so bad. The guitars’ distortion effect helps establish a balance in the mix. Same goes with the bass. And Craig may deliver a bit higher death growls than before in his final recording. As for the other three songs, I’d stick with whichever mix you liked from the two records these three songs came from originally. As I expected, Essence Ablaze shows a bit of potential, so it’s up to you which version you liked the most. The clean production sure gives it a different texture, but it didn’t turn out so badly. The Ibex Moon, as I’ve stated in my earlier reviews, is pretty much the worst song. And the short Blissful Bloodshower always has that potential due to its brutality, but it just won’t shine on me.

As for the original songs - and if you want to include in the title track which now has Craig behind the vocals and the unexpected cover of Death‘s Scream Bloody Gore, there’s surely a bit of refreshment within the music here. This is the first release the band focused more on the speed, rather than the slow and dreading doom elements, and it sounds great! I love the guitar writing on the opening song; how the riffs develop the speed as the song progresses. The other original songs speak for themselves, albeit they’re not as fast as the opening song. But then that cover... It never occurred to me it was originally Death. Not only I haven’t listened to the original in a long time, the cover here sounds so different, I gotta give the band props. I thought this was another original song in the tracklist. Either way, the cover isn’t as good as the original. It captures most of the music, but I’d prefer to just listen to the original instead.

Is The Forsaken Mourning of Angelic Anguish one of the band’s worst releases? Yes. However, it’s not pointless. Considering the main aspect was the speed the band focused on, this was part of a different direction musically and not some recycled sounds again. Yet, it’s an EP and not a full-length that should be taken seriously, but enjoyed for what it is. The best song is Shadows from the Ancient Empire.

So, here we have the final piece of the Pillard/McEntee era, at least in the studio. Craig Pillard was the ruptured-throat-bellow force on Incantation's first 2 records, creating a vocal style that has been imitated and rehashed ad nauseum in today's throwback trend of looking to Incantation and other old school death metal bands as a reaction to the tasteless and soulless blast-wankery of bands like Psycroptic and Fleshgrind.

Although he would play with the band a few times in 2008, this would be the last time his voice would grace the doom-hammer of Incantation. And although this is just an EP, it is a fitting end to a great era, and formally catapults Incantation into the future. While Craig Pillard would never return, this album marks a maturation of John McEntee's songwriting and the beginning of his partnership with Kyle Severn on drums. This album bridges the two eras of Incantation, firmly securing them as spot among death metal's career elite's. This album came at a crucial point; it followed years of touring for their first 2 albums. Here, Incantation demonstrated their ability to mature, and proved that they could continually craft excellent, memorable songs from scratch, without a stash of youthful compositions to draw from.

Production-wise, the album could be seen as hit-or-miss. I can understand how some people would be turned off by it; upon first listen, you get hit with this mid-rangey guitar honk, not unlike the trademark Boss HM-2 distortion pedal sound of Entombed, Interment, Necrophobic, and Dismember. That sort of sound is a love-it-or-hate-it kind of thing. Its not at all overbearing, but I could see some people not liking it. Drum-wise, the album is a little lacking from the first impression. The kicks are triggered, so you can hear them clearly, but they don't have a lot of oomph to them. The mix is very focused on the midrange and high-end; the cymbals cut through well, but the tom-toms don't have a whole lot of impact. The snare cracks really well, but thats not anything out of the ordinary. But after you get settled into the music, the production really allows this material to come alive. Its just not an immediately accessible sound, which some may see as a huge strength.

Mix-wise, the album sounds great. Everything is balanced very well. Its focused mostly on the guitars and vocals, but nothing is jumping out as being too out-front or awkwardly placed; I do wish the drums were a little bit louder though. The vocals sit very well, and there is a great amount of separation in the mix, so that you can hear everything clearly, except the bass guitar, but I'm on laptop speakers right now so thats not a fair assessment. Everything is very dry, and in a way it sounds a lot like Morbid Angel's "Blessed Are The Sick" in terms of the instrument tonality and mix separation. But like I said, after you listen for a minute, you become used to it, and it sounds normal, and allows for a great representation of the fantastic music contained within.


Song-wise, this album has a lot of strong points. It starts off with the catchy fan-favorite "Shadows From The Ancient Empire" which would later be found on Diabolical Conquest, with a slight change in the title (Shadows OF the Ancient Empire). Musically and lyrically, the song is absolutely identical. I compared them, and couldn't pick out any difference, aside from drummer styling and some of the fills. I was never a big fan of this song, but it has grown on me a lot lately. This is a great example of expounding upon a theme, because John McEntee milks a lot of creativity out of the main verse riff, varying it in different ways with the drums and picking patterns.

Next up is the first thesaurusly-long-titled song of Incantation's career, "Lusting Congregation of Perpetual Damnation (Eternal Eden)". This song is AWESOME, and features some of the best Incantation songwriting ever. The speed-picked riffs are wicked catchy and memorable but still evil and badass (kind of like Morbid Angel, although they don't sound at all like them). Its too bad they never play it, because this has one of the most awesome build-up parts ever (beginning at :49). This song also has a bunch of guitar solos, which is unique for Incantation. Incantation has always had them, but this song has 3. Then at the end, we get treated to a traditional crushing Incantation doom-groove; this song just kicks ass.

Next, we get a glimpse of what Incantation would do on later records, with the track "Triumph In Blasphemy": they make shit sound like the band is playing live, with a segue inbetween tracks. Its like the way jambands jam into and out of songs, making a seamless transition. This sounds almost like a live interlude where they do a chord rave-out with feedback, and say a little blurb introducing the next song. Thats really all this is; its only 20 seconds, so there isn't much to comment on. But this paves the way for the stuff John does on later albums, where he makes each track flow into the next as if they were playing live, in the studio.

The next track, "Forsaken Mourning of Angelic Anguish" features more classic Incantation riffing, with pinch harmonics and some chromatic speed picked riffs. Parts of this song remind me of "Unholy Massacre" off of Onwards To Golgotha, which is totally fine with me. Then there comes this really cool groove that features Kyle doing some neat tom-tom grooving underneith Craig's guttural blasphemies. This track is short, also, so there isn't much to comment on, but its a great song, with a lot of action packed into such a small space.

Then, here comes the old school, a fucking awesome take on Death's classic "Scream Bloody Gore." I have to say, Incantation does a fucking awesome job with this. Its really interesting, because this showcases exactly where death metal comes from, and how much the genre owes to Chuck, but also it makes it obvious how far death metal has also progressed, since it comes after a tune full of blastbeats and other craziness. Its really cool hearing Craig sing this, too, because it really takes it to a whole new level of brutality. As much as I love and respect Chuck, I was never that fond of his voice, and it wasn't that low to begin with. Which is okay, but hearing Craig rip into that chorus.... god damn.

After this we get one more short blast-package of dont-blink-or-you'll-miss-it Incantation in the form of "Twisted Sacrilegious Journey Into Our Darkest Neurotic Delirium." wheewww, that was tough lol. Nile totally took this idea from Incantation. This is "Blissful Bloodshower" part II; straight up hyper-blasting, a pinch-harmonic riff, more blasting, and the end. Songs this short always seem like... I don't know; I understand having short songs, but I think grindcore is absolutely retarded with their 9 second songs and 53 track albums. So, I'm up in the air with this I guess. The music is awesome; I just wish there was more of it.

Lastly, we have the outro track, titled "Outro". Its just some cool wind chimey sounds overtop some sort of like, distant thunder or wind swells, along with some other nightmarish and dungeon sounds. It progresses, with some weird sheering sound effects in the middle, so it has a forward trajectory like a song, but 5 minutes of this is a lot... I love Morbid Angel's interludes, but at least Trey keeps them under 2 minutes, or makes them really cool like "Place of Many Deaths," "Victorious March of Rain The Conqueror," or "Hymn To A Gas Giant."


All in all, this is a great fucking album. The music is absolutely top-notch, the production is done well, and it has Craig Pillard. This is like a quick little dip into a dark world of evil and blasphemy, with a whirlwind of darkness and horror. Its high energy all the time, with satanic hymns of christian destruction and other lyrical blasphemy courtesy of John McEntee. Incantation isn't satanic, but they're anti-christian, which is very cool.

This album is even more worth the price with the reissue bonus tracks. I'm not sure what they were for, or when they were recorded, but they feature Daniel Corchado on bass, who would play bass on Diabolical Conquest. So, I'm guessing it was some sort of studio rehearsal thing for live shows, or to make a promo for the new lineup, seeing as "Shadows From The Ancient Empire" would also turn up on Diabolical Conquest.

Anyway, this album is fucking awesome. The reason for such a high score is that the material is absolutely top-notch, Craig Pillard is singing, and the production is great. It would easily be a 100 if there were maybe 2 more full, traditional songs on this, to make it a full-length. Given the creative outburst that John seemed to have at this time, I can guarantee that any more tunes would be awesome. But also, they did have more material, because they put out a promo in 1996 that featured a track that would show up on The Infernal Storm, as well as the opening track to Diabolical Conquest. If "Shadows..." was re-recorded for that, why not include these 2 also?

However, I have heard many stories that Craig Pillard is.... a difficult, unpredictable person with emotional issues, so I can only assume that something kept them from being able to work any futher, seeing as he was absent from Diabolical Conquest (Oct-Nov '97), and that album was recorded only 8 months after this album was recorded (Feb '97)

So, in the end, you should buy this album. Don't download it, buy it. Incantation is one of the few bands working today that deserves our hard-earned money, because John has been slugging it out non-stop for over 20 years now, and has never had a fully stable lineup, yet still continues to put out quality death metal. If you are a fan of any Incantation album, you will love this. If you are a fan of other death metal, this album would serve as a good introduction to the band, as it features all of their trademark stuff, with a focus on the faster side of things.

This disc is DEATH FUCKING METAL. Not the mid-paced kind, not the Swedish kind, just straight brutal double-bass evil straight from the USA. And while there are quite a few bands like this (Cannibal Corpse or Immolation being fine examples), Incantatiion do differentiate themselves from the pack.

The lyrics are anti-Christianity with a little bit of anti-Christianity thrown in for variety, and the vocalist sounds like he came straight from the pits of hell - really low, gurgling, rarely moving into a high-pitched screech. Like I said before, the drums are pretty much straight speedy double bass, and the bass is tuned low so that it often just mixes into the wall of sound Incantation produce. The guitar seems to enmesh itself in this wall too - every instrument including vox just produces a deep, dark mass of sound.

My favorite song on here is probably "The Ibex Moon," a doomy crusher with death metal speed thrown in here and there. Maybe it's just because the song is different that it really stands out. Not that this album is extremely monotonous, and in fact I can listen to it the whole way through, but overall the rest of the tracks blend together. I don't care for the cover of the Death song though, that might be because I don't like Death. So, a good pickup if you like blasphemy and low-as-hell fast death.