Abismos

Now that I think about it, Dead Warrior is one of the few (if not the only) deathcore bands I know from my country. I think there were these guys Ebola, but I’m not really sure about it. Anyway, I used to hate deathcore with all of my might back then, but then I started to progressively get into it to the point that now is a genre that I listen to very often. That doesn’t mean that there aren't bad acts to be found, however, as with any other genre, but I ended up appreciating it one way or another.

What we have here is Abismos, the debut full length by Argentineans Dead Warrior, who had previously put out one EP titled The Progress of Disaster. Deathcore tends to have bands influenced by melodic death metal/Gothenburg style on one side and those that mix the more brutal aspects of death metal with metalcore/hardcore. Dead Warrior would fit in the former category, as their sound has a lot of melodic death metal on it. In this regard, I’d say they are like a heavier version of As Blood Runs Black, with more metal elements than the American band. The Gothenburg riffing is present throughout the entire album, emphasizing melody with a slight technical twist, and given my devotion towards the Swedish scene, I couldn’t ask for more. There are also some “blackened” tremolo melodies here and there, such as on “Cosecha de Sangre”, “Nox Aeterna”, “Perpetuo Sacrificio” or the beginning of “Solsticio de las Almas”, accentuated by the fast drumming and the inclusion of blast-beats, which are indeed very good and tightly executed.

However, the fact that this is a deathcore band automatically brings me to the breakdowns. This is really sad, because the songs are very well constructed and they flow nicely, but whenever they reach to a kind of climax on any song, it’s instantly mitigated by the inclusion of this resource, and let me tell you that they’re quite bad and dull. I’ve come to a point where I no longer care about breakdowns, it’s like I’ve internalized them after all this time, but seriously, these are really bad. The main riff of the first song, “Cosecha de Sangre”, is played like four times once it comes in and right afterwards comes the breakdown, and you’re not even one minute into the song. Other times the vocalist will sing with a rather annoying tough-guy voice, such as on “En Órbitas de Fuego” and songs like “Augurio” are actually made of one enormous breakdown that takes different forms throughout its playtime.

It isn’t a bad album, by no means, but lots of the good ideas that you can find here are watered down by the generic breakdowns and the dull backing vocals. This wasn’t that bad of a blind purchase after all, I was quite satisfied with the results, but almost always you’ll find things that you’d change about what you’re listening to, and while the melodeath part of the band is fairly good and consistent, the breakdowns aren’t. It’d be nice to hear these guys explore their sound and put the breakdowns aside for a while, or try to improve them. Also, their lyrics about mythology kind of set them apart from other acts, showing a different approach in comparison to your average deathcore band. It’s not the be all-end all of its genre, but it’s not a failure either, and its short duration makes for an enjoyable deathcore album.

Originally submitted to http://theforlornson.wordpress.com/