Gory Blister pick up where they left off after the fantastic 2006 release ‘Skymorphosis’. These Italian technical death metal purveyors show no sign of taking their foot off the gas with this new release. The infamous difficult third album syndrome is certainly not present for these guys; this kicks your rear end from start to finish.
‘The Hatch Opens’ kicks in and sorts the men from the boys, this band have always been a great talent, they deserve more accolade’s for their efforts in some circles, this is technical death metal at its best, taking leanings from the great Chuck Schuldiner himself with an intro possessing some evil black metal scales, before pounding your mind into the dirt. This album is more heads down death metal, the technical riffing is still present but it does not appear to be as overpowering during the verses as on their previous releases, until the solos come in, then it goes berserk. The insane revelation continues with ‘All Vanishing Ruins’ that starts out again as a black metal rasping riffing machine. But then drummer Joe La Viola cannot help starting his fast tempo crashing, but then this one is more light and shade, the tempo itself changes throughout the track and I am actually thinking of latter day Satyricon with added technical death wizardry. The only downside I found on this album was the final track ‘Emit Despale (remix)’, remix being the ultimate statement, it’s a techno/EBM track, it’s just not really suitable for this release in my mind, but it shows another side to the band.
‘The Descent’ restores the death metal balance, wonderfully executed chugging and bouncy rhythms make this a damn fine listen, insane brutality for fans of Vader. ‘Emit Despale’ (an instrumental of death metal not the dandy remix silliness as earlier mentioned) takes the tempo right down into Morbid Angel territory before ‘The Slum of the Wretched Creatures’ brings things back to the boil. There appears to be death metal influences from every continent on this album, man it is a head-busting listen, even with the added progressive riffing and time changes battering you around. The latter section of the album increases the momentum even further and does not give you a chance to catch your breath, some Suffocation intensity rears its ugly head, now that cannot be bad at all.
Italy has provided us with some killer death metal bands in recent months, Gory Blister being one of the original bands on the scene; normally people look to Poland, America and Sweden for their death metal fix. I think it is the case that you should also be checking out Italy. Gory Blister has produced an album of technical perfection and pure angry death metal. This is a great release, but we need some live dates please!
http://www.goryblister.com/
http://www.myspace.com/goryblister
http://www.mascotrecords.com
