Más hombres, menos estatuas

(Reincarnation – More Men, Less Statues)

1. A Matter that Names You
2. Party or War
3. Cotton Brains
4. Two Suns on the Throat
5. Thanksgiving
6. The Flight of the Anchor
7. Bite the Death
8. The Eighth Mantra
9. Uniformed Thought
10. The All of the All
11. Utopia
12. Insolent Sun
13. Arrow in the Fog
14. Subterranean
15. Solemn Masses

This has to be, shamefully, one of the worst metal (?) albums ever made in South America. Everything has been going down, musically speaking, for Reencarnación since their acclaimed debut “888 Metal”, but after this is hard to believe that they can make something even worse.

From the very start of this monument to mediocrity, you can feel things are not going to be nice at all. A stupid voice, with no intonation at all, shouts (supposedly) dark, grim phrases to create the appropriate environment. It would be hilarious if it wouldn’t be so pathetic.

Then comes “Fiesta o Guerra” (Party or War), by far, the worst track on this album; all you can hear through the whole song are mumblings and strange voices accompanied of pop-style drums, more appropriate for a carnival parade than for something you would expect to be metal, which unpleasantly combine with lousy, predictable guitar riffs and a lame percussion work. Alex Oquendo from the legendary Colombian band Masacre makes a couple of grunts with his powerful voice at the beginning and a few words later, but that doesn’t make it better at all (on the 7th track all he does is one single scream). Too much fiesta, no guerra at all.

There’s no need (or sense) to comment song by song, since everything else is pretty much the same: annoying voices, boring riffs, poor bass and drums performances and ridiculous lyrics; I had heard this album a couple of times when it was released, but to be honest, I only listened the whole thing now for writing this review.

Flecha en la Niebla is the only track to be highlighted on this sea of tastelessness, since it’s a beautiful acoustic piece with no unfortunate voices or other instruments to ruin it (that’s why 5%).

It ends as bad as it began, with a lame speech by someone who sounds more drunk than macabre. But, of course, the production of this recording is impeccable, since it was made in El Pez Studios (Medellín), where many great Colombian metal albums have been recorded; albums that, unlike this one, will be regarded as classics.