Dissect'd by your reporter in the field!Okay. First things first - if you even think that you kinda sort of like death metal, get this album. It's probably as complete a death metal album as has been released recently. This blows Nile all the way back to the sarcophagus which spawned them.
King of All Kings was good, but fairly criticised as being a "one-trick pony", an endless procession of blast-'n-grind cardboard cutout tracks. Well, this is different. Very different. It's still as brutal as before, but there's real thought and effort gone into crafting individual songs, with unconventional rhythms and variations in instrumentation and style.
The drumming's excellent, as you might expect from Roddy, and there's tonnes of very memorable riffs and nice solos. Erik's clearly been working on his stuff, and it shows. The title track, I, Monarch, is very strong indeed, based around a pattern I like very much, which Napalm Death used to use a lot in their very early days - the sludgy, slow riff placed over a frenetic blastbeat. As a nice bonus, the refrain contains some distinctly Voivodian chords. My favourite tracks are Behold Judas, probably, and Faceless One, but it's consistently strong throughout, unlike King of All Kings where you could skip a few tracks and not really miss anything.
It's eclectic and chaotic and brutal, but smart with it - the last track, Faceless One, is an instrumental which just feels immense. It's like something Death might have done, all tricky rhythms and harmonies and jazzy drumming.
This album is brilliant. And yes, Warcorpse, I think it's even better than Vital Remains. 
This is my early tip for best death metal this year (including Behemoth) - Hate Eternal have grown up.
posted July 02, 2005 04:39
