Review Summary: Not even veteran bands like Dismember could release an album like this.
Entombed took death metal to another dimension when they released their legendary album
Left Hand Path. Never before had the death metal scene experienced that type of guitar sound, the gnawing raw and utterly gritty guitar sound that many bands would later copy.
Dismember and
Bloodbath also used this type of ultra-distorted guitar sound they were also able to release quality death metal albums. But was it only the Swedish bands that used this type of sound? No, there was a band in Germany that would follow their European neighbours.
Fleshcrawl from Germany proved that it was not just the Swedes that could create extreme old-school music with that distinctive guitar sound.
Fleshcrawl is one of Germany's oldest death metal bands and they play standard death metal which is heavily influenced by the Swedish death metal scene. Their sound is undeniably heavy, brutal and raw while their music actually carries traces of melodies and catchiness.
Fleshcrawl is like a morbid mix between
Entombed,
Dismember and
Bloodbath. And people who are familiar to those bands can easily figure out how
Fleshcrawl can sound like.
In 2004
Fleshcrawl released an album named
Made Of Flesh. This is probably one of the most overlooked death metal albums of the 21st century.
Fleshcrawl has managed to blend relentless brutality and aggression with small amounts of melodies. Exactly like the music that
Dismember are famous for. It is facebreaking death metal which is just on the edge of being melodic death metal.
Beneath A Dying Sun and
When Life Surrenders are two fine examples where the band has molded in some really good melodies in the middle of all the brutality. While
Carnal Devourment and
Made Of Flesh displays the total opposite with their ferocious speed and advanced guitar work. You could describe this album as a blend between these albums:
The God That Never Was,
Left Hand Path and
Resurrection Through Carnage. The end-result is a brutal slab of gritty and filthy death metal!
Made Of Flesh is packed with stuff that would make most old-school death metal fans to drool. There are two primary aspects that makes this album to stand out and that is the phenomenal guitar sound and guitar performance. If you are looking for some really brutal and devastating guitar tunes then this is the album for you! The guitar sound is incredibly distorted but it also has a lot of thickness as well. This makes the guitars to sound ultra-gritty and absolutely crushing. All the power-chords and murky tremolo-pickings create an atmosphere that no Swedish band has managed to deliver before. Every song is covered in this haunting and dark atmosphere tanks to the immense guitar sound. But it is not just a guitar sound that makes the magic; it is the people behind the instruments.
Fleshcrawl goes for simplicity in this album but you can hear that the guitarists Mike Hanus and Oliver Grbavac are some really talented guitar players. From chugging muted riffing to power-chord mayhem to creepy tremolo picking, these guys has it all covered. Especially in
Carnal Devourment where every note is played with enormous precision and speed.
Scourge Of The Bleeding Haunted has some really nasty riff lines as well. Unfortunately however, there are not many guitar solos. There some here and there but it is no fancy strings-weeping or arpeggio pickings. Most solos starts like your typical solo but they end with
Slayer-esque ultra-bendings.
Sven Gross definitely knows how to deliver a great vocal performance. His growls are really deep and guttural and you can even hear the actual words. On occasion he raises his pitch and delivers some nice sounding screams, or shrieks whatever you prefer to call it. Sven is not a unique growler but he certainly does the job right and flawless. Bastian Herzog who is the drummer delivers a mighty fine performance alongside the guitarists. Every drum-beat, blast-beat and pedal work suits perfectly with the guitars.
Damned In Fire is great example where the guitars and drums is in perfect balance with each other. When the blast-beating begins then the guitars go berserk and when the pedals starts to rattle the guitars goes into another calmer pace and so on. The only one left is bass player Tobias Schick and there is not much to mention about him. He is yet again the poor bass player that you can’t hear because of all the other instruments. You can't hear one single bass note due to the immense wall of sound that the guitars are creating.
Made Of Flesh is yet another album that proves that simplicity can kick ****loads of ***!
Fleshcrawl is definitely one of the best old-school death metal bands in the field today and
Made Of Flesh is the album to backup the fact. This is an album that no Swedish band can match, not even veteran bands like
Dismember could release an album like this.
Fleshcrawl makes melodies to sound angry and unpleasant and that is pretty damn successful for a death metal band. These types of melodies are no baby cute melodies like
In Flames has nowadays. Most important is that the tracks in this album actualy stand out and no track sounds similar to another. People who are huge fans of the Swedish and European legions of death metal bands must look into this album and band. If you listen to
Dismember,
Entombed,
Bloodbath or
Centinex then it is time to add
Fleshcrawl to that list.
