Dead and Buried

In a world with hundreds if not thousands of death metal bands, all trying to make their mark on the genre, inevitably some of them are bound to be somewhat overlooked. In some cases it's probably better that certain bands and albums lie buried in obscurity for no-one to suffer through, but there are some bands that deserve far more praise than is given to them, and such is the case with Jungle Rot. Though not entirely obscure, they're not exactly a household name even in the metal community, which surprises me when they have an album as good as Dead and Buried to their name, an album that so effectively takes that old-school death metal vibe and injects it with a respectable amount of groove, tunes it down a bunch, and sets it against the background of the Vietnam war.

When I say a "respectable" amount of groove what I mean is that while most of the songs on this album do have a nice groove to them (Strangulation Mutilation, Psychotic Cremation, Misplaced Anger, Another Fix are all great examples) it doesn't go overboard, and it doesn't stray too far away from the death metal sound you'd expect, it just adds a touch of groove to it, and the result is a fairly unique (if simple) album.

The main word that comes to mind when I think of how to describe this album is "chunky". The guitar and bass tone combined with the mid-paced, groovy nature of the riffs create a sound I can only describe as chunky. The guitars are very heavy and low-pitched, sounding almost like early Suffocation, but with much more width, and a deeper tone. The bass provides the backbone to this massive, crushing sound, demonstrating it's thumping, fairly clear tone on the bass intro to Circle of Death / Jungle Rot. In keeping with the overall bass-heavy sound, the vocals are some of the lowest growls you'll find outside of slam, similar in pitch to Amon Amarth, with just a little touch of Asphyx, except they sound more raw, almost grimy, like the vocalist just gargled blood. The lyrics this twisted voice growls out are for the most part a little above average for death metal, with some great lyrics on Red Skies, Virus, and Psychotic Cremation, with the last having some almost Slow Deep and Hard era Type O Negative lines, such as:

I'm gonna tie your body to my truck
Leave it in a trail of blood and guts
Bones will start to rip out your skin
Roadkill will never be the same

The drums on Dead and Buried are good but not outstanding, playing mostly simple rhythms, light on the fills, with some hammer blast beats thrown in, but never anything insane. They make you really feel each song without distracting you. If you only like George Kollias style drumming, you'll be disappointed, but the drums on this album do nothing but add to the overall flavor, in all the right ways. All the instrumentation on this album goes to show that you don't need to be a prodigy to create some really kick-ass metal, and that sometimes the ability to write memorable riffs is more important than being able to play a million miles a minute. That's not to say that Jungle Rot can't play their instruments though, quite the contrary, as simple as nearly every song is, they're all played really well and very tightly, and you can tell these guys enjoy playing every minute of it.

Dead and Buried is overall a really strong album, full of great riffs and excellent vocals, with an absolutely massive guitar tone. Maybe some people would say it's too simple, or maybe others would condemn it for not being fast enough, but these are both strengths to Me. Jungle Rot are devoid of pretentiousness, and give an honest and kick-ass performance, setting themselves apart from the ever-growing crowd of death metal. This album doesn't try to be anything it's not, and for what it is, it's damn good.

Jungle Rot formed at an interesting time during the history of death metal. The old school scene had sparked to life rather suddenly, like a Frankenstein freak, sewn together haphazardly from different body parts of old school thrash, the more vicious side of hardcore punk and the first wave of black metal. The first flickers of the brewing genre can be traced way back to around 1985, and Jungle Rot was no where near in sight at that time. In fact, by the time Jungle Rot came to light (or darkness) in 1994 and released their first proper album in 1997, the brewing of death metal was over, and the beer already drunk. The original old school scene was in its death throes by then, and bands started to fade away or change styles dramatically (usually for the worse, obviously). Even the mighty Obituary was dead and buried (pun intended) in 1997, clearly one of Jungle Rot’s biggest influences. This puts Jungle Rot in a peculiar position chronologically—too new to be old school and too old to be new school. Yet, intriguingly, they sound about as primitive, archaic and old school as you can get, although with modern production techniques. This holds especially true on Dead and Buried, an album released quite awhile ago in 2001—but still in the realm of “modern” I would argue.

So Jungle Rot (like Obituary) has changed about as much as Will Smith has in the last 20 years, and they keep releasing the same album over and over again. However, that’s nothing to really complain about, because you’re buying their style, not just their album, and if you like one of their albums, you’re bound to like all of them. I don’t want to give readers the wrong impression though, as there are differences between albums, but it’s mostly in terms of production and guitar tone. Dead and Buried has a somewhat muddy and unpolished production and guitar tone, certainly in comparison to their later albums, which are a bit overproduced, if you ask me. Jungle Rot is a band that benefits from being able to play with as little polish as possible, just enough to make all the instruments balanced and audible—in other words, the bare minimum. This is also confirmed from how they sound live—they fucking kick ass. Dead and Buried, interestingly, has a very similar production and guitar tone as their demo album; Skin the Living. The guitars and vocals are a bit muddy and smeared into the overall production, while the drums pummel you unapologetically in the foreground, with combinations of the infamous skanky thump/snare/thump/snare attacks. Just as a point of reference, I find Slaughter the Weak to be their muddiest and bassiest album in terms of guitar tone and production, while like I mentioned, Dead and Buried is very similar to Skin the Living, with a slightly more mid-ranged guitar tone and less murky production.

I guess now I’ll go ahead and talk about what (or how) Jungle Rot play and sound like. I also guess I’ll only have to do this one time (even if I happen to review all of their albums, sometime in the next 20 years), and proceed to copy pasta this into every review, because like I said, they don’t change. They are fucking Neanderthals, of course they don’t change. They can’t change; they are too primitive, dumb and caveman-ish. This isn’t an insult at all, it’s a ringing endorsement. Quite frankly, intelligent death metal that tries to be all sophisticated, slightly annoys me (*cough* The Chasm *cough*), I often don’t like it very much. And Jungle Rot is the polar opposite of this. I could honestly describe Jungle Rot’s music like so: grr grr, chug chug, thump thump, and be done with it, however, I’ll expand slightly for the uninitiated.

Jungle Rot play mid-paced death metal with a ton of slow doomy breakdowns and occasional up-tempo thrash breaks with faster tremolo-ish riffs, ala Obituary. For an obvious example of the songwriting similarities between Jungle Rot and Obituary, just compare the closing half of "Strangulation Mutilation" to "The End Complete", especially in terms of the start/stop pacing and drumming, and you'll see what I mean. Their mid-paced sections and doomy breakdowns are almost always playing a simple ultra groove riff that even Grave would be impressed by. Jungle Rot is also the king of the fucking skank beat. They play the skank beat as often as Michael Jackson “played” with kids at his Neverland "ranch" (too soon?). Their doomy sections usually have a simple, rock-ish snare/single kick drum beat combo going on in unison with the riffs; it’s totally fucking awesome and headbang inducing. The double bass drumming often enters in during the faster, thrashy breaks or as a precursor to them. Rinse in blood and repeat the above, in some combination or another 13 times, and you have a good idea of what to expect in Dead and Buried.

I was reading along to Jungle Rot’s lyrics for Dead and Buried the other day, and I was honestly impressed at how intelligible and clever they were. In fact, they were so clever I was almost a bit disappointed. Consider the following lines from “Red Skies”, the highlight of the album, in my opinion:

“I know a thousand ways to kill a weak man's heart,
and I know a thousand more to tear your life apart.
I'll take your child, your home, and everything you know.
All lives I touch are mine, the lowest of the low.”

This is brilliant….unholy shit. How the hell did these Neanderthals write such brilliant, clear and coherent lyrics? I want my Jungle Rot to be retarded and dumb, and grunt stupid barely intelligible shit, like the following:

“Take knife….run ‘round….stab people….dey fall down.”

Now THAT should be lyrics for Jungle Rot, but…maybe it is. I’ll have to look further. Anyway, the lyrics are actually quite good on Dead and Buried. A lot more time and effort went into them than I would have thought, and I have to commend Jungle Rot for that. Also, Jungle Rot’s lyrics are great for another reason; they tend to center around war and the gruesome destruction of the human race in some form or another. It’s awesome.

Dave Matrise delivers his vocals in a very rhythmically catchy caveman-ish, yet comprehensible, low to mid grunting style. At times, he does indeed remind me of the legendary John Tardy, especially with his mid-range grunts. However, when he randomly throws in those occasional screams (often at the end of a lyric line), it most reminds me of George “Corpsegrinder” Fisher. Can’t go wrong with either, that’s for damn sure. Don’t get me wrong though, Dave Matrise has his own unique vocal style/delivery and it really lifts up Jungle Rot to another level of hateful ape-ish derangement.

If you love your music in the form of a blunt force trauma to the head, from a caveman’s wooden club, then Dead and Buried is totally for you. Jungle Rot is pure caveman meat and potatoes death metal for the people who love Obituary and Cannibal Corpse, but think they can sometimes get too fancy. There isn’t really a “right” or “wrong” album to pick from Jungle Rot, but I always feel it’s best to start at the beginning. So if you’re new to Jungle Rot, give Skin the Living or Slaughter the Weak a try, and if you like that assault, then give all their albums a try. I would classify Dead and Buried as perhaps their third best official full-length, behind Slaughter the Weak and Fueled by Hate (although very close in quality to the latter). Their recent albums are a bit more sterile in production and guitar tone, which drops them down a peg, so I wouldn’t recommend starting there. However, if you find yourself continually coming back for more expeditions into the rotting jungle, then those albums are worth your time as well….because hey; once a caveman always a caveman.

Jungle Rot could be regarded as a Johnny come lately, though they got into the game a bit late and missed the boat on the whole brutal craze spearheaded by Suffocation and Cryptopsy to embody the implicit trend following nature that tends to go with such a title. In truth, they are more of an obscure throwback to an earlier time when death metal was more closely tied to both its thrash metal and hardcore roots. And in a somewhat ironic twist, with each new album their style devolves rather than evolves, seeking after an even more primitive swamp to let the carcasses rot in with each new LP.

"Dead And Buried" can be viewed as a logical devolution from the old school thrash infused "Slaughter Of The Weak", which was itself a rather inspired Cannibal Corpse love fest with a side-order of Six Feet Under styled groove and hardcore breakdown trappings. Here things function more as a hardcore groove love fest with a side-order of traditional Cannibal Corpse, as the riffs have become even more stripped down and repetitive, and the tempo has largely slowed to the pace of a limping soldier with a bad case of foot ulcers befitting the band's name. To be sure, there are still thrashing moments throughout, but they are chopped up, slower, and generally fleeting amid the down tempo grooving.

While a lot of the sweet detailing, occasional blasting, and the Kerry King inspired guitar solos have been stripped from the equation, this still largely finds itself in old school death metal territory, sort of like a baker who makes the same yellow cake but this time without the frosting. All the essentials are in place from the Barnes meets Tardy guttural ravings to the down-tuned sludge with a still thrash-like punch and precision, but it does get a tiny bit redundant and may have done well to have been cut back in duration to a level comparable to their debut. It's fairly analogous to a Ramones concert that goes on for 35 minutes when 30 minutes is the limit, and it's easy to catch one self not bothering with the last 2 or 3 songs for the whole formula getting a bit played out.

Nevertheless, death metal isn't only about flash and intrigue, and much like with the short-lived 80s incarnation of Terrorizer, there is something to be said for just decapitating the victim outright rather than bothering with a ceremonial death of a thousand cuts. That's pretty well how "Dead And Buried" functions, as a sort of constant theme playing over a cinema depiction of modern warfare in all its grotesque glory. There isn't really any way to go wrong with an album like this if Obituary and early Cannibal Corpse agree with the ears, through naturally the executioner has his average and above average chops at the block.

This is Jungle Rot's 2nd full length, "Dead And Buried", and if you've heard Jungle Rot before, you know what to expect: no guitar wankery, no blast beats,no overly long prog death epics. Just awesome, simple, heavy old school death metal.

Simplicity is what makes Jungle Rot the band they are. They write the simplest riffs you can think of for a death metal album, couple it with simple drumming, and polish it off with run of the mill death metal vocals, so it should be bland and boring right?

Not at all. Jungle Rot's simplicity equals heaviness, and this album is definitely heavy. The production is noticeably bass-heavy, which only makes those simple but effective riffs and simple but effective drumming even heavier. Really, think of a generic death metal riff you could play on guitar, and I'd imagine there'd be some variation of it on this album. The riffs they play drive the music along nicely and just scream "death metal". You know, the kind of death metal that was around before Necrophagist and Brain Drill. The kind that focused on the heaviness of the music, which made it so enjoyable.

Despite being really simple music, it almost never gets boring. Every song has great headbangable riffs that never let up. The vocals are standard death grunts, and the lyrics are the stereotypical death metal lyrics about violence and war and what not. If i had one complaint its that the vocals just are kind of boring. However, the music itself more than makes up for it.

If you love heavy, simple, riff based death metal, you need to check this album out. It won't blow your mind, but when you need something just to bang your head to and actually have fun enjoying, "Dead And Buried" is a perfect choice.

Saying 'this is a Jungle Rot album' should really suffice as a ringing endorsement, but I feel the need to elaborate very slightly on it.

This is about the point in Jungle Rot's career where hardcore starts to take the place of thrash in the band's sound; sure, there's enough skank beats and single-string tremolo riffs to please those who need their death metal artificially oldschool, but the presence of one-chord breakdowns of what are essentially a hardcore variety really take precedence. It's all for the better; Jungle Rot has without fail always been about the groove, and the rapidly disintegrating presence of anything approximating an uptempo passage just accentuates this. Now Jungle Rot just moves from blunt DM groove to hardcore breakdown, only barely pausing here and there to pop in something kind of fast.

The songs are blunter and dumber than ever before. Jungle Rot can, amazingly enough, write a fantastic breakdown along with their already incredible grasp of oldschool death metal groove. Apart from the hardcore influence, Jungle Rot's music remains essentially unchanged: short, three-minute songs centered around pulverizing groove riffs, borderline retarded Tardyesque vocals, and one of the most spectacularly measured drum performances in the world. Nothing NEEDS to change; this is just perfect as it is.

I guess in short if you don't like this you really just hate death metal. Absolutely essential along with the band's entire discography.

... and that sentence could have been the entire review.

You know, with Jungle Rot you already know what you're about to listen just by looking at the cover and seeing their logo on it. Proggy solos? Uber technical riffs? Meh, just fucking simple riffs, simple drumming and simple vocals. But, no matter how dumb the music is, you can't fucking stop listening it. Seriously. Whenever a song starts, you can only headbang to those amazing riffs.

The guitar work is amazing. Not in the sense of flashy solos, or riffs that could pass out as solos without much problem, but in the sense of old school brutality. Simplicity over wankery, that's what this album, well, that's what the band is about. Most of the songs are composed entirely by groovy riffs, and, even if you happen to dislike groove (which is my case) you can enjoy its catchiness and its heaviness. Because this is really goddamn heavy. It has also some thrashy moments, were the riffing speeds up from the usual mid tempo and delivers some old school-ish death/thrash moments. And there are no solos! Not at all! Is it a bad thing? Not in this case. In fact, adding solos would be one of the worse things that Jungle Rot could come out with.

And then comes the drumming. Again, consistency over wankery. But I must mention that the double bass is greatly played during the entire album. During most songs, it just acts as a background company to the riffs. It's never really fast, aside from the aforementioned double bass. The faster beats are played along with the thrashy riffs, which is not really common, but helps to make the album even more entertaining.

The vocals are refreshing in the modern death metal scene. Not piggy squeals, not guttural growls, but something similar to what bands like Obituary used to do in the early 90's. Low, yes, but without being ridiculously low. Again, in the Obituary vein. There are also some higher screams, similar to some of the ones Cannibal Corpse used to have in their early stuff.

I completely dislike to mention this, but the bass could have been way better. It's almost unexistant during most of the songs. A stronger bass sound could have made the album even better than it is.

So basically, if you want some artsy, proggy and "inteligent" metal, don't even think on getting this. If you like your metal heavy and simple, like in the old days, what are you waiting for?