The Calculus of Evil

A very short-lived collaboration founded by ex-members of the black/death metallers Pessimist (still active), the guys looking for a project with which to vent out their passion for the technical side of the extreme metal roster. A great job done all over including on the debut which was a strong showing with echoes of Gorguts’ colossal “Erosion of Sanity”.

Yes, it’s technical death metal we’re talking about, one that goes a few notches up in the composition-weaving department on the album reviewed here, the delivery not very easy to categorize recalling other more autocratic formations within the death metal circuit like the Russians Hieronymus Bosch and the Belgians Pestifer. In other words, expect multiple labyrinthine configurations with dizzying time and tempo shifts, the inordinately complex at times approach guided by more conventional growling semi-shouty death metal vocals.

Virtuoso guitar acrobatics in the vein of Necrophagist can also be detected (“Descending“, “Might Is Right”), and not only occasionally, the guys arguably achieving better results with a more composed, less nervy song-writing (the brilliant twisted mid-pacer “Den of Wolves”) with interesting short, all-instrumental (the lyrical flamenco-induced “Poison Sleep”, the operatic jazzy “Psychotogen II”) sketches scattered around, opposing to the longer progressive takes on the genre that are the encompassing, larger-than-life saga “The Gilded Slave” where hallucinogenic riff-formulas tussle with quiet balladic etudes; and the hyper-active symphony “Lying in Wait” which is executed in a slightly hysterical manner close to the dazzling brutality movement (Suffocation, Cryptopsy, Decrepit Birth, etc.). However, the highlight award goes to the exquisite “Thy Will Be Done” where surreal angular riffage ala Mekong Delta and Nomicon shakes hands with gorgeous melodic hooks to a nearly overwhelming effect, the guys relaxing at the end with a cover of Judas’ “All Guns Blazing” the singer easily winning a medal for his admirable attempts at matching Halford’s piercing introduction; nothing fancy on this one save for a few more intriguing bassy burps, a fairly faithfully executed cut with more tolerable semi-clean vocals (could be another singer?).

There are a couple of interesting quiet respites witnessed on some of the tracks, suddenly utilized without any warning that can be considered another plus here, thrown in the midst of a dazzling super-intricate dash, retaining the element of surprise the latter remaining quite high throughout with the various nuances embedded, again making it hard for one to strictly place this act’s repertoire within the established branches. There’s a lot happening within just one composition, especially the mentioned lengthy ones where the listener may get confused with the very frequent change of scenery, but it all comes nicely rounded up in the end, the band never sending the plot out of sight.

Moments of genre-transcending surreality sneak in here and there, suggesting at diversification campaigns within the death metal roster, but it was too early at the start of the new millennium for one to draw the lines of such speculative movements based on just a few isolated strokes. One will never know how active in this particular trend the guys would have been as they didn’t last very long, unfortunately; a very strong momentary showing that kept the fanbase optimistic, full of anticipation for similar intricate, “evil” exploits.

This has some modern spazzy tech death in its sound, but overall this reminds me more of a band like Psypheria than Malignancy; it's more virtuoso tech death than 'how many changes can we put in' tech death. Actually this reminds me a lot more of bands like Spastic Ink in certain places than most other death metal bands; the melodic sense is typically not very 'death metal' and the way the music is delivered is pretty sheerly proggy a lot of the time- the death metal often feels like kind of an afterthought. That's probably the reason I don't like this album very much.

This is a little too goofy for me; some of the melodies just sound bizarre for the sake of weirdness and the excursions into more traditional prog territory grind against the death metal in a rather weird fashion. Hell, I'd go as far as to say that this is only death metal in the way Atheist is death metal; yeah, the aesthetic and some of the melodic sensibilities are there, but you'll never confuse this with Suffocation. In fact, this reminds me greatly of Annihilator in that the songs often feel like elaborate tech demos rather than actual compositions most of the time; there's a lot of twists and turns (though not quite to the extent of, say, mid-era Cryptopsy) but all the changes sound like they're present just to show that the band can do them. The songs don't have any real point to them and it becomes really obvious when you see how the band is really unsure of how to move from one passage to the next; the music generally breaks down in a rather fumbling way into a slower passage before the band just moves on.

All the technical performances are top notch, of course, but that's kind of par for the course these days, isn't it? Additionally, the technicality is a point in and of itself and not a means to an end: yes, this is extremely technical, but the album really only exists to be technical, not because there's any sort of real artistic expression to be found. One of the most telling points of this album is that the flamenco-inspired acoustic guitar sections are much, much more interesting than any of the extreme metal. Weirdly enough, this album both has not enough repetition and too much; a lot of songs are based around one or two main musical ideas and the band just keeps arbitrarily changing the filler around those ideas. From a teaching perspective this is great but I can't imagine why I would actually LISTEN to this.

Admittedly I don't hate this as much as I ordinarily would just because the virtuoso aspect of this is rather interesting- it has a distinctly different vibe from most tech death, and while it's still not necessarily good, it at least stands apart from the pack of post-2000 tech death. I can't really recommend this to anyone but ardent tech fans, but it's really cheap, copies are everywhere, and it provides enough amusement for a few listens.