Exhumed - All Guts, No Glory
I’ll be honest, I haven’t given much of a shit about these guys since 1998’s semen-al classic, Gore Metal. So, that makes 13 long years since Exhumed have really done anything for me. However, something told me this album was going to be good. Call it a hunch (back), a (six hundred and sixty) sixth sense, a gut (ted) feeling, or ESPN, I just felt that after an 8-year hiatus that Matt Harvey would be hungrier than Billy Milano at a Ponderosa. You know, it’s a damn shame I don’t gamble more, because I was right as rain. This album is more than just a return to form, it’s a cumming of age. The old stuff felt like quality ’70s Hammer Horror, but consider this album a gory psychological thriller (where Natalie Portman finally gets naked). These sickos have come light years musically. Just listen to those Maidenesque melodies on “Your Funeral, My Feast.” Not to mention all the top notch Swedeath-style guitar solos on this cut, and throughout the entire album for that (fecal) matter. If someone’s written a catchier Death/Thrash anthem than “Through Cadaver Eyes” this year, I’d like to hear it. “But I thought Exhumed played Grind,” said the poseur. Feast your ears on “Distorted and Twisted to Form” and “Necrotized” then, pussies. It’s actually how professionally this record is stylistically amalgamated that puts it over the top. Some songs sound like vintage Brutal Truth on meth, others are like Carcass genetically spliced with Bonded by Blood-era Exodus. Then other tracks do sound like Harvey & Co. circa ‘98. The album is just solid. Well designed, multi-layered, and multi-textured, just like my last bowel movement. A few moments of embarrassing vocal weakness by Harvey, probably just a little rust, are all that keeps this from perfection.
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