Blood Oath

As much as this record sucked, it’s also a sad one since this is the farewell of Mike Smith, who’s one of my favorite death metal drummers. Whatever Blood Oath was trying to deliver and display in terms of the music, it failed. The only things I found to be better are the production, a strong technical bass, and this awesome album cover. The record has quite a lot of editions, with different bonus tracks. To combine, there are three instrumental versions of the first three songs and three rough mixes of the second and third songs (again) and Cataclysmic Purification.

The title track was a simple listen with nothing exciting, lacking technicality and presenting rather fast, grooving riffs and heavy bass lines. Of course, the drums sound fantastic and addictive. Pray for Forgiveness is one of the slower songs. Nothing special but catchy riffs and a good guitar solo. Images of Purgatory has an insane, catchy intro, but the rest of the song was disappointing. It was rhythmically melodic and then downgraded to mediocrity. Cataclysmic Purification has amazing and creative guitar riffs, though no guitar solo, which was surprising, considering Terrance’s phenomenal solos. Come Hell or High Priest is yet another groovy song with a unique structure, especially the choruses, showcasing an outstanding guitar solo and catchy riffs. The bass is quite audible, so that’s a nice touch for once. Rest of the songs follow the same direction, albeit with a little potential of sounding better. And Material Decimation was surprisingly good, thanks to the production (still doesn’t beat the original).

As for all these bonus tracks, the instrumental versions give you another glimpse of the music the band recorded, and they sound a bit raw. The instruments sound crispier, compared to the cleaner and toned-down (debatable) versions with the vocals. Despite stating the title track’s simplicity, at the least the instrumental version was enjoyable. Obviously, Dismal Dream is the better song; rough/clean/instrumental. With the rough mixes in between, which I’m not sure how rough they truly are because they kinda sound clean… Anyhow, I’ve read that some people liked them over the cleaner mixes on the main tracklist, and they are in fact great. I believe that's how the whole record should've sounded.

Funny enough, I mostly liked the shortest and longest songs. Dismal Dream, being the shortest song, maintained heaviness and was alright for its structure, with the addition of a heavy breakdown. As for the longest song, Provoking the Disturbed had the most to offer. The verses are great, the choruses having the band saying 'Truth' in a gang style, and you have atmospheric bass lines to prepare you for the amazing guitar solo/s.

In the past, I stated that the self-titled was worse than Blood Oath, but now it’s the other way around. Although this record has more potential than the predecessor, and it illustrates by the ratings I gave to both of them, the music here is predictable, commercial, and generic. I wanted to hear more out of songs like Images of Purgatory and most of Cataclysmic Putrefaction for their incredible riffs. Despite the potential in these two songs, Come Hell or High Priest, and Undeserving, it was still pretty hard to enjoy this record. Giving the fantastic production, song ideas and the overall music, most of these aspects didn’t deliver very well, and the best songs hardly accumulated for the entire record to make it better. The instrumental version of the title track, Dismal Dream, and Provoking the Disturbed are the standout tracks.