Illud Divinum Insanus

Yep, this is happening. The dust has settled and the room has cleared, so why not tackle this infamous album? I was turned off from initially dissecting “Illud Divinum Insanus” at the time of its release because (a) the ensuing backlash included almost all seven billion assholes on the face of the planet chastising the band, and (b) I found it so godawful I couldn’t finish it from start to finish. For years it dwelled in the musty purgatory that is my music collection, until now. With the news that Morbid Angel has once again joined forces with Steve Tucker and dropped several of its members, I started to refresh my memory of Tucker-era Morbid Angel, especially focusing on “Formulas Fatal to the Flesh”—an album I’m quite fond of, as it was my first Morbid Angel album, and thus holds added value rooted in personal nostalgia.

With my Morbid Angel chubby nearing critical mass, I figured it was time to finally make “Illud Divinum Insanus” face judgment. My memory had mostly been wiped clean of whatever the hell lurked in its chambers, save for flashes of fourth-rate death metal songs and industrial tracks placed into Morbid Angel’s style as delicately as a fart during a moment of silence. Coming back to the CD after four years of what is the equivalent of remembering you have a chained-up monstrosity that has been wasting away (and for good reason) up in the attic served as a painful reminder of whatever the hell Morbid Angel thought they were doing and the bovine, less-pathetic moments of the album that show a once-excellent group artistically crapping out on itself.

The greatest tragedy of “Illud Divinum Insanus” is that it tries. Like a slow-witted scrub who sits open in the end zone on the last play of the game, watching as the pigskin spirals in the air and plummets right in his reach, only for it to bonk off his helmet and hit the turf, it tries. Whatever Morbid Angel thought they were doing creating this hybrid of death metal and industrial stuff took balls the size of Mars. The fact that these songs are so detailed that each track is sort of its own chapter in the grand scheme of Morbid Angel’s wild and wacky world seems clear as day that David Vincent and Trey Azagthoth nitpicked and touched up every square inch of “Illud Divinum Insanus” to the best of their abilities. They tried to make this record the modern marvel of Morbid Angel, and I guess that’s exactly what they got, but for all the wrong reasons.

The performances here are just performances, really. Two radical shifts in the Morbid Angel paradigm occurred a few years before this was conceived. First, David Vincent made his long-awaited return, replacing vocalist/bassist Steve Tucker as Morbid Angel’s voice and bass fingerer. Second, Pete Sandoval, whose role as a technical and physical powerhouse had played an integral role in Morbid Angel’s rise, was replaced by Tim Yeung, whose ultra-clinical style is the opposite of the life-filled, violent assault of Morbid Angel’s longtime drummer. The core mechanics of the Morbid Angel sound are jeopardized by Vincent, whose uniform shouts are more inoffensive than anything, and further complicated by Yeung’s lifeless, human computer performance on the percussion side of things. Trey’s solos are harmless, which is a total shock given how his lead work is usually mind-boggling and among the best.

The mediocre routines littered throughout “Illud Divinum Insanus” serve to augment the utter dreadfulness of whatever Morbid Angel created, or as I like it think of it, shat out. Saying these tracks knock on the door of total garbage would be putting it gently; they are utterly fucking atrocious. The big elephant in the room are these industrial influences, the main reason why “Illud Divinum Insanus” catches hell. Industrial touches, done right, could have actually done wonders in supplementing the modern Morbid Angel assault, and there is certainly no complaint on my end that the band tried to do something new. The problem with the electronic influences is that they work against these tunes, and are generally fucking horrendous.

Any sort of subtle placement or feeling of amplified intensity is blown off the face of the earth by the sheer awfulness of how misplaced and wonky Morbid Angel sounds trying to wrap their arms around the electronic world while juggling a feeble sense of death metal. They come off sounding misdirected, and, in the case of a few special specimens, reach levels of musical crimes against humanity. “Too Extreme!” is almost unbearable, throwing around electronic drums and sound effects and Vincent’s gutless vocals while the band teeters awkwardly on this unnatural chasm between death metal and something I don’t want to hear. The worst song here, “Destructos vs. the Earth / Attack,” deserves a lifetime achievement award for how fucking abominable it is. The groove-dance vibes placed over Vincent’s manipulated vocals and its wobbly rhythms transcend any form of abuse currently whirling around my personal abyss of insults. Needless to say, the industrial elements blow up in the band’s face at the force of an unpinned grenade.

But it’s not like the album gains traction when the musical I.Q. jumps up to double digits. “Blades for Baal,” “Nevermore,” and “Existo Vulgoré” try to find footing on the death metal side of things, though their efforts end up doing little worth mentioning. Morbid Angel’s past was built on subtlety and atmosphere, but these tracks are tedious, directionless, unstimulating. The riffs have no bite, Tim Yeung drums like any death metal drummer on the face of the planet, and Vincent barks his monotonous tone to the point of disgust. At least “I Am Morbid” brings a new flavor to the table, albeit one that manages to somehow rival the album’s stupidest moments with its arena rock vibe and Vincent shouting the chorus like a broken record. “10 More Dead” sounds like Machine Head, therefore it sucks shit, and the infamous “Radikult” uses these cringe-inducing vocals and instrumental bits so appalling that the last tune is covered by its shadow. “Radikult,” in all its objectively awful glory, is the ruler of the retardo kingdom.

Cycling back to the final track, it’s actually somewhat interesting how “Profundis - Mea Culpa,” an industrial tune inspired by the Morbid Angel traits found throughout “Illud Divinum Insanus,” gets a bit of a break from the well-deserved flogging. While not superb, it certainly seems perfect notched up to the other atrocities. At the very least, this one earns a smidge of credit for not having its head jammed four inches up its own bum. Otherwise, having this instable approach of Morbid Angel’s flaccid death metal template next to industrial tracks boasting a proud and flamboyant edge when the intended tenacity is in fact completely misguided makes for an experience on par with a bout between a retarded Superman and a feeb made of Kryptonite. One might be better than the other, but who cares? The sheer lack of quality on both sides of the spectrum is inexcusable.

Here’s the point: “Illud Divinum Insanus” has not aged with poise. In fact, I’m more appalled by the constant onslaught of horrible song after horrible song now than I was back in 2011 when I first heard the electronic bopping of “Too Extreme!” and thought there must have been some kind of pressing mistake. The occasional apologist may pop up and call this ahead of its time, but that’s a bucket of horseshit; there is no redemption here. Long story short, it’s “Illud Divinum Insanus,” and it’s pretty much the worst thing ever.

This review was written for: www.Thrashpit.com