Deicide, Overtures of Blasphemy, 2018 (ENG)

Deicide, Overtures of Blasphemy, 2018

By: Erreh Svaia

Rock N Roll Animal

First clarification Overtures of Blasphemy is not the debut album by Deicide or Legion, and I doubt very much that at some point it pretends to be, Glen Benton and company are still light years, or “shadow years”, of the musical condition that made them famous in their first years, we must admit that overcoming those first two albums is a monumental task, already discarded by the band long ago.

Second clarification, Overtures of Blasphemy is a good album of brutal Death Metal, lost in the past have been those bestial riffs and inhuman rhythms, instead, there are traditional heavy metal riffs and drum execution very much in the vein of bands like Slayer, whatever made the first records so unique, left the band a long time ago, and although 50% of the band is still intact with singer or “growler” Benton and drummer Steve Asheim, the deep unmistakable mark of the guitarists Eric and Brian Hoffman has proved difficult to delete, instead, Kevin Quirion and Mark English play a decent role but nothing spectacular, more traditional Death Metal rather that chainsaw guitars.

First track, One With Satan marks a clear line that is faithfully followed throughout the recording, themes more primitive than complex (closer perhaps to what the Venom classics used to do), simple drum patterns at full speed and guitars that seem to imitate certain very specific aspects of the style of the Hoffman brothers, but which would even be overshadowed by the guitars from Painkiller by the Judas Priest.

Second track, Crawled From The Shadows releases a powerful drum discharge that comes down because of guitars lacking the rabid ferocity needed, the genius of someone like Trey Azagthoth (of Morbid Angel) or the cohesion of some Cannibal Corpse playing, Benton is missed it does not seem impressive enough to take Deicide to those glory days and even the athletic work of Asheim is not enough here.

However, songs like Seal The Tomb Below or Excommunicated are promising to some extent, with the band getting something of that demonic intensity that seems to have been snatching the years away, possibly making them lose that peculiar step that used to distinguish them, and sometimes as in All That Is Evil, making them sound somewhat obsolete and irrelevant at all.

Nothing spectacular in the rest of this Overtures of Blasphemy, Benton and his reputation only seem unable to highlight this once "sacred" monster of Death Metal, despite having the veteran Asheim, a disc that makes me think a lot about the genius once conjured by the four original members and that it has been almost impossible to invoke again, Benton was not that key point of the group at the end, and although they can still create quite competent music, that spark of diabolical genius of his early years it becomes increasingly clear that it will not return.

Last clarification, Deicide's first album was like an atomic bomb that shook the whole scene (and me) of Death Metal in general, it was the years of the "holy land" of DM, Florida and the legendary Morrisound Studios, were the times when the Death Metal resembled Hulk, the legendary antihero of Marvel Comics, a primitive beast that hid a brilliant scientist's mind, that scene would fall apart because of the excesses of technical skill and over-polished productions, which would degenerate into two aspects, an ostentatious similar the worst of the progressive rock of the 70s, and a commercial piece of garbage called "Nu Metal", few bands would reach such importance in this once great genre, Deicide with the maniacal Benton, flanked by the brothers Hoffman and their great riffs mix of rage and talent , the Morbid Angel with the powerful David Vincent and the anti-gravitational guitars of Trey Azagthoth or the Cannibal Corpse, totally unleashed and uncontainable, the very conception of what was thought was Death Metal to the extreme, for a moment, Deicide were unholy untouchable.