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Review Summary: Distinctly Vader, yet at this point in their career that is all that can be said for the band. Bland, uninspired, and mostly uninteresting. The opening moments of Vader's 'Black To The Blind' inform the listener of exactly what to expect, and from there a judgement should be made as to whether to continue listening. A tidy drum fill, bland yet inoffensive guitar riff, and the roars of "Down with God, Angels and Demons". This is a Vader album through and through, for better or worse, and yet there was a feeling of stagnancy setting in here; an intangible sense that this was just more of the same and that the band were trying too hard.
To speak positively on the record for a moment, this is yet another Vader record containing riffs galore, and whilst they are not the most unique, there is no denying the band's knack for stringing together dozens of riffs without any sense of a clash. The band really plays it safe here with the songwriting, but that is not to say that the music itself is devoid of merit. The roar of "why" in the closing moments of Heading For Internal Darkness is a memorable moment, as are the spoken word verses of Carnal, which lead into the vicious and effective chorus. The closing title track has a strong opening riff that feels frantic and yet coherent, and the drumming atop the second riff gives off an early-Gorguts feel. Piotr's vocals - often the most maligned aspect of the early Vader albums - actually sound really good on this record, being a little more natural than on their debut, and mixed far better than on 'De Profundis,' to the extent that he is a surprising highlight to this recording.
The negatives are not especially numerous, but all boil down into that same aforementioned broth of samey complacency. Vader are not known as a band inclined to reinvent the wheel, so to speak, but have instead been a consistent stalwart in the European death metal scene. Unfortunately, there are so many standout moments on this album, that it pales in insignificance overall. The breakneck pace at the ending of Foetus God would have been far more memorable, for instance, than if they had been followed up by the ambient introduction to The Red Passage, and this then leads into a mid-tempo section with nothing but a pace to headbang to, rather than actual memorable riffs or drum flourishes. Following this, it is straight back into the blast beats, such is the Vader formula.
Revisiting this 1997 entry in the Vader discography clearly highlights the need for the band to experiment more than they are known for. Saving my final positive until last, True Names stands out as one of the most well known and popular songs in their entire discography for the fact that it is a song where the band at least attempt to do something different. The opening tremolo riff feels surprisingly effective when paired with the more restrained drumming and the nice drum fills at the end of every few measures. The transition into the verse is one of the best riffs the band has ever constructed, and the pinched harmonics in the verse help it stand out. Things are all playing out nicely for a solid Vader slower effort, before the last third of the song explodes into a carnage of blast beats and urgency. The use of higher pitched tremolo riffs here during Piotr's vocals sound impressive, and this is really one of their best songs. It is just a shame the rest of the album struggles to lift its head above the mire for long enough to claim its own identity.
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Album Rating: 2.5
5th best vader
6th if counting necrolust and/or morbid reich
| | | Album Rating: 4.0
easily the second best... with this they carved out their straight-forward-version-of-florida-death-metal sound. it is progressing (even thou for worse not for better) from De Profundis. After this and some few parts of Litany they went on autopilot and remained there ever since. But this is still original, nothing at the time sounded like this.
Somehow the review blames this album for something that Vader should be blamed for with all subsequent albums: stagnation.
| | | Album Rating: 2.5
> But this is still original, nothing at the time sounded like this.
malevolent creation, deicide, most florida dm
| | | Album Rating: 4.0
nope. this was waaaaay more straight forward and in a sense even melodic than Deicide and Florida DM of the time. A lot faster than malevolent too
| | | Album Rating: 2.5
lol ok
| | | Album Rating: 4.0
The ultimate incantation sounds like medium level florida DM.
| | | Album Rating: 2.5
this band was never exceptional or particularly original, on that much we agree
they peaked with the demos and coasted on being in the right place at the right time like a hundred other B-rate dm bands that people coom all over like theyre classics when theyre just generic retreads of stuff that had already been done
listen to hellwitch, atrocity, thormenthor, supuration etc
| | | Album Rating: 4.0
yeah, Hellwitch are a different beast... do you know their discography box? Some of the unreleased live stuff (from late 80s to 2010s) is freaking incredible and Transgressive Sentience was so freakingly far ahead of its time...
Early Atrocity was great, but a completely different thing than this aesthetically, being twisting, turning, surprising instead of driving and pummeling. But they actually took a turn faaaar worse than Vader later on...
never listened to the other 2.
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Weirdly low review rating, at release time, the album was universally lauded.
| | | Album Rating: 3.0
"Weirdly low review rating, at release time, the album was universally lauded.
"
I'm not gonna argue with you, but Terrorizer definitely didn't laud it and nor did fans of the band, given that very few of the songs were in their sets even a year later. This is just from a brief google search, and from my own memory of seeing them twice that year.
However, again, I'm not gonna argue with you, i'm sure some outlets did give it huge praise
Universally is the wrong word though, since its generally viewed as pretty mixed and is almost always in the middle/bottom half of rankings of their albums also
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^^My previous post was an observation based on the mainstream Hellenic metal press (which echoed its foreign counterparts to a a significant degree), namely Metal Hammer Hellas in the '90s, which use to laud nearly everything, and Vader was no exception.
As I result, people had FOMO syndrome, translated to buying everything in order to stay relevant as metal fans.
The metric of album merit you imply - the songs of an album that survive in a band’s live set through time - is a very solid one, agreed
| | | Album Rating: 3.0
Oh fair enough, like I say I wasn't gonna argue with you either way, different people remember different aspects. The album itself isn't awful, but its definitely a drop off from their first two and just feels boring
| | | Album Rating: 3.5 | Sound Off
idk why ppl would say standard dm is bad like its more good sht
| | | Album Rating: 2.5
park is mainly into bands that rip off atheist
| | | Album Rating: 2.5
granted most those bands beat vader lol
one thing about vader is their refusal to commit to DM vocs doesnt work when theyre trying to play 90s dm
| | | Album Rating: 2.5
theyre solid though id never bitch if i was in a room drinkin beer and someone throws on vader. but i cant name any vader tunes except dark age and thats just cause the music video
| | | Album Rating: 2.5
might do a smok style discog run of vader!
| | | Album Rating: 3.5 | Sound Off
doooooooo iiiiiittttttt soooooooooonnnn
| | | Album Rating: 4.0
Hmmm, Sonic, for me it is a bit the opposite. My main gripe with all their Post De Profundis stuff is that it is too much made for immediate understanding and humming along...
For memorable tracks try Carnal, Balck To The Blind, The Red Passage from this one. But mostly go back to De Profundis. Silent Empire is a top 20 Death Metal Track with an incredible build up, 'Sothis' is slow but with incredible shifts throughout, quite memorable too!
Dark Age IMO is not that remarkable, except for the very early 90s music video...
| | | Album Rating: 3.5 | Sound Off
get rekt sonic
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