Incomplete

Nembrionic - Incomplete


I assume most of us know the Dutch metal scene. The Dutch metal scene has (comparative to the amount of people in the country) produced many top rate acts in pretty much every field of metal. I still wonder for example why Dutch death metal is as big as it is. I do not know any bands in say Belgium or Germany with the same amount of acclaim as Pestilence, Asphyx or more recently bands like Legion of the Damned or the death metal supergroup Hail of Bullets.

From this old and legendary death metal scene Nembrionic emerged. First emerging on the scene under the name of Nembrionic Hammerdeath. They initially played death/grind according to the archives, personally I have never heard their old material. In fact I’m not familiar with any material of this band prior to this album. In 1994 they shortened their name to Nembrionic and the (I assume) truly active period of the band started. They did a few interesting things in their first years as Nembrionic. They released a split and made a collaboration album with Dutch old rap group Osdorp Posse.

I guess more than a few of you are tempted to bail on this band right now. I can tell you that there is not trace of hiphop influence on this specific album. This album is actually full on thrashy death metal with its grinding moments. If i had to compare them with any bands it would be bands in the modern death/thrash style like Legion of the Damned but they play harder and faster. This album has quite a bit more drive than anything the aforementioned released. The album starts mostly fast paced and furious but as it progresses you come across a few songs with parts that are slower. Still above mid-pace for most of it though. This helps keeping stuff varied and interesting as while the riffs are all competent, the vocals engaging. I do not think this style of music lends very well to having a bunch of identical songs on an album.

As i said before this album mostly resembles bands like Legion of the Damned. The reason for that lie mostly in the riffs. The riffs are mostly thrashy death metal with a touch of groove. Occasionally they put a grindcore riff into it. The vocals are mostly a barking growl with the occasional higher pitched shriek. The bass mostly follows the guitars and is not very audible, but is noticeable if you know what you should pay attention to. The drums are what you expected of the genre, plenty of competently played blasts and other beats.
One thing that sets this album apart is that it has several instances of typical dutch humor. For example the track fleshman jabs a bit at goregrind and the track Riotkill: Roadkill has random exempts of the band telling various stories and doing silly things. However at the end of the day despite the show of competency in every regard, it just never feels to me as more than solid. It is fun, memorable and has its own identity but there is no moment of true brilliance. Yes the band would seem overlong at 48min, but more than 10 minutes of that can be blamed on all the random excerpts on the Riotkill track. I’ll just stamp it with a 8/10.