Review of Anima - Enter The Killzone

Despite deathcore being somewhat of a dirty word, it hasn’t stopped the likes of Chelsea Grin, Carnifex, Annotations of an Autopsy, and Germany’s Anima from dropping some solid, if more death metal inspired releases early in 2010.

I wasn’t overly impressed with 2008's The Daily Grind, and while Enter the Killzone is a much better release, I’m still not sure why Metal Blade signed Anima when they already have much better acts like Job For a Cowboy, The Black Dahlia Murder, Whitechapel, Rose Funeral, Molotov Solution, Fate and (rumored) standouts Painted In Exile on their roster. Anima simply mash together elements of all those bands into their clichéd, if powerful sound.

As with Carnifex and Annotations of an Autopsy, there’s been a bit of maturation and more of a death metal development, as Anima is now much less purely rooted in The Black Dahlia Murder. They have fleshed out their sound with a thicker burlier bottom end and vocalist Robert Horn has developed a better fuller deep growl to go along with his Trevor Strnad screams, but the music, despite the more brutal approach is still second tier compared to some of their peers.

Not that Enter the Killzone is a bad album, it fits in nicely as far as production and ferocity with the aforementioned acts that have released albums thus far in 2010, and I’m not cringing when it’s playing. And actually, a few moments here and there do actually standout such as “Loner’s Reflection,” “Carnage Provoked,” “The Omnipotent Torture King” and “Necromantica” and all have a few chords and riffs that break away from the standard but frantic blast, rasp, breakdown, growl template, but not too far away. Even a couple of tracks that feature samples of some synths like “Black Night” and “XXXIII” are still stock deathcore and ultimately, there’s really nothing that will make me listen to the CD again voluntarily.

Release Details

Anima

Enter The Killzone

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