Beyond Cops. Beyond God.

My curiosity in future releases by bands I’ve encountered is irresistible, even if I think the band is utterly terrible. Whether my subconscious is laboring under some illusion of a pleasant surprise or I simply have some masochistic tendencies at time, even with the likes of cheap deathcore drones like Waking The Cadaver, a $2 bargain on something I will likely hate is still incentive enough. However, I must admit that the assertion that the band had made some improvements since their pork drenched crapshoot of a debut were actually correct, to a point. Perhaps in a bit of ironic self-realization of how piggish their sound was, they’ve elected to title this revamped follow up “Beyond Cops, Beyond God”. While the second half would only apply if the god in question was the deity of domesticated slaughter fodder, getting beyond everybody’s least favorite siren toting bacon jockeys is a winning sales strategy.

In terms of actual changes, this parallels the switchover that “Job For A Cowboy” recently went through pretty closely, dispensing with the slam death riffing approach in favor of something more in lines with older death metal orthodoxy. The chief influence is Dying Fetus, though unfortunately it does a poor job of realizing said band’s signature sound. The riff work, while less breakdown happy and groovy than before, still gets way too heavy on the stagnant chugging and abrupt tremolo passages. Missing from this arrangement is the needed time for each element to mature that Cannibal Corpse is more adept at putting forth. Nonetheless, there’s some solid riff sets to be found on “Terminate With Extreme Prejudice” and “Reign Supreme” that, while being heavily derivative of early 90s Morbid Angel and Suffocation, are listenable. Pretty much Don Campan’s ridiculous pig squeals and a few gratuitous studio effects on the other vocalizations are what sink these otherwise generic, but passable tunes.

There are really 2 things that stick out about this release that separate it from the horrid image they’ve become associated with it on previous work. The first is a production that actually makes some iota of sense, particularly with a drum sound that isn’t so tinny and poppy that it feels like a toothpick jabbing at your ear drums. The guitars are still too gooey sounding during the groove sections, but the blast sections are notably cleaner and stronger. The second aspect of this album that is redeeming, albeit they come up super short in this department, is something actually resembling ambitious songwriting. “Sadistic Tortures” is actually a solid death metal song with loads of technical sections that wouldn’t be out of place on “Destroy The Opposition”, barring the lackluster grunts and constipated pig noises. Throw in a few solos to go with the decent riff work, and over 5 minutes of this stuff would be pretty fun.

Ultimately, much like a number of their deathcore cohorts, this is a band that is pretty slow on the uptake and will probably need another album or two to really get this right. Essentially what we are witnessing here is the death of deathcore, as each one of these bands decides to revert back to a formula that can at least work on a generic level, and speaking for myself, it can’t come quickly enough. But even still this is not a good purchase even for people looking for Dying Fetus clones, unless it can be procured for as dirt cheap as I got it and you don’t plan on listening to it a whole lot.

Originally submitted to (www.metal-observer.com) on April 2, 2011.