Dawn of the Apocalypse

There seems to be something of a resurgence lately in older styles of death metal - a peaking of interest seemingly sparked by the success of Angelcorpse over the last few years, and labels are slowly starting to put out more and more of this style, something I am thankful for. When I say 'older styles' I don't mean the retro bands that are (thankfully) now fading in popularity, or the grunt-and-grind gore deathcore (the so-called 'brutal death metal') that never really went away (it just went to the Midwest), I am talking about the infernal, anti-religious, overtly Satanic style of thrashing death that descends in a direct line from Possessed and their first album, Seven Churches. Perhaps it was the revival of interest in all things Satanic, raw, corpse-painted, and bloodthirsty brought about by the successive waves of the black metal bands, or the inevitable wearying of the masses brought about by that trend's inability to completely saturate these shores (or Australia, it seems) - a blockade based on attributes shared by both nations' characters? I don't really know, but this style of death metal is coming back in a big way, and it seems to be centered right here in the States. The filthy revenant of Cogumelo rises again.

After a suitably chilling chorus intro, spanning a few frantic climactic seconds, Vital Remains plow directly at full speed into the first song. The impact is readily discernible: you have heard this before (or you should have, unless you came to the scene within the last few years), and from many different bands: the Morbid Angel worship, the thick, heavy-as-lead guitars gut churning on simplistic rhythmic riffs, the drums splashing, crashing, blasting, and syncopating everything in sight, and the vocals scarring your ears through combined high and low tones: bottom-of-the-sea thing that should not be vocal cord abuse, and screeching caterwauls flying to scar the landscape of God. The new vocalist Thorns combines a soul-swallowing Benton groan and high homicidal screams to good effect (sometimes at the same time to give the listener that 'Legion' feel) and truly erases from my mind any memory I might have had of this band's former throat. Excellent job.

When it comes to the rest of the Vital Remains formula, however, I am not as impressed. Even after repeated listenings the songs tend to blur into each other, and the epic length of a few of them ('Sanctity of Blasphemous Ruin', the fourth, runs over eight minutes) is trying at times. Because their length is based more on an establishment of a dark violent atmosphere (and that atmosphere being constructed from relatively simple musical elements or themes) instead of an exploration of many different song segments, things can get a bit monotonous at times - especially since they are not really offering anything new. A classical/spanish guitar overdub mixes things up on a few songs (starting with the title track), and that's a nice touch, but it serves mainly to distract rather than add to the heavier distorted guitar underneath it. The completely acoustic 'Came No Ray Of Light', in the middle of the album, does work, however, because it serves as a small oasis of calm among the prevailing carnage. I remember this band's first album, and on that release they were successful in creating truly infernal atmospheres mainly because their personal melodicism was, at times, so bizarre. I hope that this band continues to experiment, not necessarily with industrial music (as the eighth track, 'The Night Has A Thousand Eyes', demonstrates - an interesting addition), but with all the different elements that are open to extreme musicians who have a concrete vision of their own potential, goals, and the road to their fulfillment. The unrelenting ferocity and percussive brutality on display here could be very effectively tempered with an original melodic sense, creating something very powerful and noteworthy.

In any case, this is another very good entry in the war to re-establish death metal, and worth listening to at least once if you are at all sympathetic to that cause.

UA

Erebus Magazine
http://erebuszine.blogspot.com

Ever more becoming one of death metal’s most articulate and sophisticated blasphemy delivery system, Vital Remains made what is for me the apex of their work with this release. Guitarist and band figurehead Tony Lazaro and multi-instrumentalist Dave Suzuki have always favored long, composed cuts, and this album is full of what are surely his most well crafted creations.

Right from the morbidly catchy but epic “Black Metal Curse,” the balance of savage riffing and memorably written refrains is plain. Vocalist Thorn (a new arrival to the band) is extremely adept, balancing deep roars with shrieks and hissing screams more common to black metal, achieving a varied and dynamic performance. The title song brings in slightly more standard metal riffing to bear, but does so in the context of boosting it’s extreme sections even more. The fact that this track incorporates somber acoustic guitar passages under it’s brooding fury only adds to it’s menace. But with “Flag Of Victory,” the band achieve a masterpiece of their genre, and perhaps the single finest song they’d yet written. Balancing blasting tempos, melancholy respites, a towering chorus and their own trademark brutality, this is one for the ages, a track I loved upon first hearing And over the years my respect for it has only grown. And for the record the sound is pretty much perfect, balancing all elements with clarity and power, making it easy to hear why this is simply one of the most technically perfect death metal bands in existence.

Does this praise sound too high? I suppose it would if you haven’t heard this record or any of Vital Remains’ work in general. Simply put if had to choose only 10 death metal records with me to ride out my remaining days in a bomb shelter, this would be one of them.

Before you get carried away with this album, let me just say this album is over hyped, claiming this album is the greatest death metal album is absurd, especially when you take into account some of early releases by Morbid Angel.

Let's not forget however, that 79 is a good mark (good not great) and while this album isn't the greatest death metal around, it's still pretty good nonetheless.

Let this review make you stop and reconsider before you rush off and buy this album off Amazon like I did. When I bought it, I felt fairly happy with my purchase, thinking that I was in for a fairly solid ass kicking from a heavy, insane death metal album. Well, here I am some what disenchanted for again, assuming the album was one thing and getting another. I was expecting a very heavy album, ala Bloodline/His Majesty but I didn't get it. So that was a huge disappointment. I would have been much happier with the album if it was as heavy as the aforementioned album.

The heaviness of the album aside, it just isn't that good. The riffs can be dull and uninteresting at times and the solos while, incredibly technical, just aren't satisfying. I didn't get many head bangs out of this album. Again, if the album had been heavier, we wouldn't probably have this problem.

Usually, good vocalists leave after 1 album or so, Themgoroth and Pehr Larsson are examples. Thorn is no exception and decided to leave after this album for unknown reasons. He is a great vocalist who changes between high pitched shrieks and deep guttural death growling. He's way better than the retard who replaced him, i.e. Glen Benton. Thorn performs vocals with a great deal of passion and his vocal ability along with the drumming is probably the strengths of the album.

The drumming as alluded to above is very good. The drummer is tight and can perform pretty technical drum techniques pretty well.

You could be forgiven to think the band was from Spain as this album has some acoustic parts in their songs (and one acoustic song). I thought it was a nice feature to include on the album.

Overall, I was disappointed with this, the main reason being I got swept away in the glowing reviews this album received. Yeah, it has its moments but all in all, this album truly is over hyped. The true disappointment however, comes from the album not being what it could have been. On this album we have a bunch of great musicians and instead of a mind blowing death metal masterpiece, we only get a good album.

I can't disagree with the other guy who reviewed this album, but it's not the best death metal album I've ever heard (that goes to Morbid Angel's Blessed Are the Sick). It's damn near close, and I can't really think of anything that is so perfectly balanced as far as melody and brutality go, and yes, that means that there is far more brutality than melody.

Let's get the bad points out of the way first. The intro, yes, I know it is from the Omen, a classic horror movie, blah, blah, blah...but it sounds fucking stupid! Why would you have that on here when you can have Peter Gilmore from the Church of Satan write an intro like he did on those Acheron albums? This is just stupid...and it sounds ridiculous even more so when put on such a fine album.

And then there's one riff in "Societe des Luciferiens." ONE RIFF. It sounds kind of happy, like a hardcore or punkish riff, and just sounds way out of place. Not bad, because it's under a blast beat, but still...what was Tony thinking?

The song lengths are a rather troublesome matter for Vital Remains. They're long, and while some build quite well, Vital Remains seems to just basically play the song twice as long as it really needs to be. The title track and "Behold the Throne of Chaos" are prime examples, where had you just cut the song in half I could add another 5 to 7 points for the score. Maybe a good producer would help? Less pot?

Now the good...pretty much the rest of the album!

Seriously, this is fucking consistent. Each riff, each breakdown, each guitar solo, sounds like it belongs there.

Best songs? Hard to say, but for me personally it has to be "Black Magic Curse" and "Behold the Throne of Chaos." The chorus on "Black Magic Curse" I find to sound particularily menacing and downright evil, and the wicked guitar solo in the midsection proves that Dave Suzuki can do more than the neo-classical shredding he normally does. And "Behold the Throne of Chaos..." Fuck...what can I say? The blasting on here kicks your face in, each change of riff seeming to become faster and more malevolent, before that breakdown comes in. And goddamn, if that isn't a catchy riff, I don't know what is! I nominate that for one of the five best death metal songs ever, right after "Abominations," "Dead by Dawn," "Leprosy," and "Left Hand Path." It's that fucking good!

"Came No Ray of Light" is a little acoustic ditty, quite beautiful and very appropriate in the middle of all the mayhem. Suzuki also does a nice acoustic solo theme in the title track, which sound apocalyptic to say the least. Vocalist Thorns contributes one track of his own "The Night has a Thousand Eyes," which sounds a bit like old Moonspell. Amazingly, this serves as good variety rather than useless, aimless filler. I wasn't expecting it to provide something enjoyable.

Individual performances: Vocalist Thorn is wild. Not as characteristic as Jeff Gruslin, but fucking insane. There's a lot of screaming and rapid fire delivery on here, alongside some really gutteral parts, which is nice. He thanks cocaine and vodka in the linear notes, and not surprisingly got fired for drug problems later.

Tony puts on a lot of good riffs. Like I said, all of them but that one on "Societe des Luciferiens" kicks ass. His guitar tone on here is particularily brutal, like a shiny diesel 18 wheeler belching smoke and crushing you!

Bass is here...somewhere.

Dave Suzuki's drumming sounds meaner than ever, and he hadn't gone over to triggered drums or incessant blasting yet. His guitar solos are varied as well, which keeps the songs interesting. I've listened to the Benton albums, and those two elements constantly turn me off from them, whereas on here, Suzuki really pays attention to the dynamics of the songs.

So there you have it...Vital Remains best, and some of the best death metal you can possibly ever hear.

WOW! That's the first thing I said when I heard the sample of the song Behold The Throne of Chaos(from this album!) on the Vital Remains website. The song may have been chopped in half to four minutes(it's actually over eight minutes in length), but it left a fucking indelible impression on my mind. So that very day, I ordered this CD directly from Osmose. It came in four days(amazing for a France to America shipment), and my head still hurts! This CD is fucking great! The vocals, the bass, the guitars, the lyrics, the drums, ALL OF IT! GREAT!!!! Combine all the best of Mercyful Fate, Possessed, early Bathory, and a little Venom, and you have this album in a fucking nutshell; without the falsettos of King Diamond and the crappy musicianship of early Bathory and Venom. All the songs come in at over 8 mintues, except for three of the tracks(Intro, Came No Ray Of Light, The Night Has A Thousand Eyes).
It starts out with a midi orchestrated introduction that sounds like it was ripped from The Omen. Then all hell breaks loose. Black Magik Curse hits, with some cheesy, yet awesome lyrics, but this is the only song with cheesy lyrics, and it just pounds your brain into jelly. Did I mention there's a fucking harmonized solo played two times throughout this song??? If I didn't, there is! And it's fucking awesome when you have it backed up against the brutality on display. It doesn't sound like something you'd hear from Arch Enemy or In Flames, but of a(true???) death metal band trying their take of it. This song is followed by the title track, which is just another rip roaring song. Combine it with an almost all acoustic(!) chorus, and you have yourself a killer song! The next track, Sanctity In Blasphemous Ruin is another song in the same vein of things. It starts off with a pretty fast staccato riff, and then just goes nuts.
Came No Ray Of Light is next, and it's an acoustic interlude. Following that is Flag of Victory which is just another solid song on this album. After that comes the best song on the album, Behold The Throne Of Chaos. This song goes through many mood swings, with a fast blast beating introduction before it sets into a groove. Then after that comes chaos, because I don't think this song would be called Behold The Throne Of Chaos if it wasn't chaotic. Also you'll probably growl and rasp along(the vocals go from a rasp to death growl in every song) with the part, "All is gone, and he... is... DEAD!," or the second time it comes to this part "All is gone, and he... is FUCKING... DEAD!" Basically fuck is used a little cheaply, but effectively. This next song is The Night Has A Thousand Eyes, which is just a weird track. Atmospheric and with some keyboards, it was entirely written by the band's vocalist at the time, Thorns. It's just another great track on this album.
Then comes the not so great. The last song Societe Des Luciferiens just doesn't stand up with the rest of the album. It sort of gets boring in the middle, losing my interest most of the time when I listen to this track. That's why I gave this album a 99, instead of a 100. If you can get past the boringness during parts of the last track, then you have yourself one of the most killer death metal albums ever recorded onto the little plastic compact disc.