Most good things come out of Sweden. Opeth, Yngwie Malmsteen, Dismembered, Pain of Salvation, Therion, Amon Amarth, Hannah Graff (Google for reference). While browsing throught the numerous albums at my local record store, I gazed upon the many, many hyper brutal music around this really, really cheap album with a rather peculiar cover, so I thought "Oh well, I was going to buy dirty magazines with this money, why not another album".
The album resulted to be from a relatively new band from Sweden named Insision, and I thought "Oh well, it's not like I won't like it". Well, I liked the album, and I think this is a pretty interesting project.
Insision are a Death Metal band from Stockholm, Sweden, and have been around since early 2000's. After struggling a while by recording some demos and alike activities, they were signed in 2001 by Wicked World, and they entered Berno Studios (The Haunted worked there), to begin the recordings of this observation. The result was a fairly decent first release.
I'll make an overall observation on lyrics: Most of them are based on grim writers like H.P. Lovecraft or satanic themes, which isn't exactly a normal thing in Death metal, but more borderline Black Metal. Nonetheless (and avoiding issues with what is and what is not Black Metal. I know this isn't, keep reading...) They are musically more inclined into Death Metal, so that's what we're picturing currently for this band. The lyrics are decent, but they are nothing too special: Some parts shimmer every once in a while, but there's nothing constantly striking or beautiful to make me think, "Oh man, this is a great lyric, this really struck me".
But onward with the music, that is more important.
Right?
Anyway, the album kicks off energetically with
World impaled, Double Bass Drums, and heavy guitars. All the album is highly technical. After a verse, there's a little breakdown and the energy is still pretty high. The song is mainly about the current stage of the world, and how badly it's going. About half way into the song, there's a slight rhythm change, and that continues until the last verse, in which the first rhythm is back. A very fast can be heard along the music, but it's quite brief. The song is pretty good, sums up the kind of music that will be heard all along the way.
A little bit of madness? This song may fit you.
Trapped within pretty much transports me to a hospital, or a bed, with a man who can't move, probably he's locked up for his mental stage. The song is also pretty energetic. I think it's time to talk about the vocals. The vocals are pretty low and gutural, but they are not completely out of human comprehension, like say, Lord Worm's (from Cryptopsy), they are low yet understandable, so they're alright. This song has a pretty straightforward rhythm, highly technical as well, and there's only a little breakdown in the middle, but that's about as much overall variations the song has.
Sadogod Begins with a female screaming. Nice change after such evil brutality. This song is mostly a satanist-themed anthem, referring to a sadistic God that is also into masochist tendencies and cute things of that nature. This one builds up fastly. There's a second vocal intervention there, a lot higher pitched, for the parts where both yell out "Sadogod!". This is one of the shortest songs in the album.
Instead of beginning furiuosly, there's at least some sense of melody when
Temple of Flesh begins. This song has a great main riff, and there's more sings of changing rhtyhms and tempos than the past couple songs. In this song also you can see one of the best written lyrics overall, not just shimmering little parts that are good. This one is overall a great song, one of my favorites of the album. This one also has satanic references.
Rewind out of Chaos starts with a rather strange rhythmic section: Nothing really seems to blend together, until the first verse ends. There are some moments in which the drums are not really focused on going extremely fast, but actually creating a rhythm. I see some mythologic references in the lyrics here, but I fail to see what this is about, overall.
One of the songs with the best structure,
Impamiiz Graa begins with fast crash cymbal, and the singer screaming after a couple times. The lack of energy in this song is easily complemented with the more melodic rhtyhm it carries, which I prefer over inaudible noises. All the songs have really short solos (or nonexistent), but the overall songs are technical enogh for me not to go rant about it. I also like this song, despite being one of the shortest ones of the album. It ends with a nice fingerpicked chord, just great stuff.
My Fever, the single of the album is probably the one that actually sums up what Insision are all about
: SOme nice changes here or there, very technical instrumentation, and decent enough lyrics. This song is based as well in this character named Impamiiz Graa, which apparently is some sort of demon king, but I didn't find anything good through my e-research. How odd. Nonetheless, this is a great song, also one of the highlights.
Before My Altar begins with some dialogue between a woman and a priest, and then kicks into blast beats and fast guitars. Yeah. THe song is mostly about questioning established religion. There are some interesting breakdows here or there, but it's in the lines of the first couple tracks, mostly. Decent enough, but just one point above average.
The last track of the album,
Ex Oblivione, is based entirely on the work of H.P. Lovecraft, and probably fanatics will find his pleasing, or at least interesting. This one is rhythmically similar to the last songs, in which there's more presence of the instruments themselves over each other, and not just a jumble of sounds going on at the same time. This track is also pretty awesome, and a great way to end the album.
Overall it's a pretty fast, short, enjoyable album. A decent first release for a new band, what can you really ask? It has it's flaws, of course: The lyrics aren't exactly polished, they need a little work but are on the right track, they just have to work on that department more. Musically they are pretty good, the instruments are on the right place, nonetheless they are nothing particular or do anything other Death Metal bands are not doing currently, or had done before them. They just need some direction artistically, that's all.
So this is a good album, worth checking out at least once.
- tojeam reviw crü
