Review Summary: Scrambled E.G.G.
In the pursuit of increasingly extreme music, Infant Annihilator’s existence was inevitable. Since the inception of all things distorted and down-tuned there's been a steady evolution towards growingly chaotic and often ridiculous sub-genres, each pushing the boundaries of ‘normal’ Western music conventions in their own respective ways. Almost without exception the more absurd and alienating of these have been rejected by the music community at large, and deathcore has certainly weathered the brunt of the criticism, but for the sizeable minority that enjoy such forays the question exists; just how far can limits be pushed? Technical deathcore sadomasochists Infant Annihilator have returned to explore that premise with their latest album,
The Elysian Grandeval Galèriarch.
If you're at all familiar with Infant Annihilator from their debut album or the considerable reputation that it garnered, you’ll have some idea of what to expect on
Elysian…. Aaron Kitcher is of course back to thoroughly abusing his drum kit at supernatural speeds. If you've never experienced the pure child-like joy of hearing the absolutely ridiculous performance Kitcher gives with his double bass drums, you're missing out. Meanwhile, guitarist Eddie Pickard alternates uncanny sweep picking and off-the-wall riffs with heavy chugging on his spaghetti-like, down-tuned strings. The newest addition to the band is the vomiting, gurgling source of inhuman sounds, Dickie Allen. His vocal presence is revealed early in the opening track ‘Unholy Grave’, once the foreboding ambient noises and the sound of a baby crying devolve into his downright evil snarl. Immediately following this, the other members waste no time ripping straight into their over-the-top style with a mixture of punishing rhythms and nonsensical licks. There's no room for misunderstanding - with such an explosive opener you just know what you're in for.
Some noticeable differences in the formula are evident since last we heard from Infant Annihilator, not the least of which is a newfound groove. The guitar playing is also much more varied than previously, and in general the band's playing has gotten tighter. Production wise,
E.G.G. is mostly adequate, and while the drumming suffers from an unfortunate tone, it's also thankfully lower in the mix compared to the brash skull-fuck of
The Palpable Leprosy of Pollution. The application of Kitcher’s techniques might not have changed much but at least when the machine-gun blast beats show up it's not the only thing you can hear. Even the bass guitar rears its head every now and then, particularly prevalent when the strings are being slapped like a disobedient child or when there's a break in the instrumentation and it's left exposed (which happens often enough given the prevalent breakdowns). Despite the advances and obvious talent of the two main band members, it's actually Dickie Allen who steals the show with a performance as consistently excellent as it is varied. A perfect example of his mastery occurs on the Black Tongue-esque ‘Baptised. Bastardised. Sodomized’ in which he goes from some of the deepest growls in the genre to an acrobatic display of snarls, screeches and screams. On the albums longest track, the colossal 17 minute ‘Behold the Kingdom of the Wretched’, Dickie starts reciting dark scripture with a rapid fire delivery that would make some rappers uncomfortable. It's safe to say that he effectively complements Aaron’s insanity with an unhealthy dose of his own.
Taking into consideration all that the album has going for it even as a conglomeration of deathcore’s most self-indulgent tropes, there are a number of drawbacks. You mightn’t know it from an ephemeral listen, but this album is just packed with diversity; the problem actually lies in the unstructured nature of the songwriting. Taken separately, the lethargy of “Baptised. Bastardised. Sodomised”, the spastic-spacey-off-the wall “Paedophilic Ultimatum”, or the blackened album highlight and closer “Blasphemian” are all very distinct from one another. You can't mistake the piercing tremolos of the latter with the lumbering chugging of the former. But when almost every track attempts something different any chance it gets, they all end up sounding the same in their indistinguishability. If Infant Annihilator focused on getting their pieces to make more individual sense, the record as a whole would actually be a comprehensible experience. ‘Behold the Kingdom of the Wretched’ really is impressive simply because the band can keep you engaged despite the ridiculous song length, but quite honestly the entire album could've been one track split into a handful of distinct parts and I wouldn't have argued with that dichotomy. This band can succeed with a pursuit like this precisely because of their overly-ambitious variance, but that ultimately weakens the
overall variation.
For what this album is, though, as an amalgamation of the most extreme deathcore clichès pushed to their absolute limit, it's an experiment handled as well as it could be. If you want to hear the craziest vocals, most vile lyrics, fastest drumming, impractical guitar sweeps, unjustifiable song structures and as much weird shit as a band can pack into an album – nothing can rival Infant Annihilator’s
Elysian….
