Review of Incantation - Blasphemy

Long-time death metalers, who should need no introduction, Incantation, have thrown a new monster into the mix, appropriately entitled Blasphemy. Incantation is known by many for their brutal attack, along with some ominously slow passages throughout their songs. Blasphemy seems to follow the same trends followed throughout everything else I've heard by the band (although this is my first full length album experience with them). Blasphemy is definitely a huge ideal behind this album, you can tell just by looking at the cover art of the CD, not to mention the word is mentioned many times in the lyrics of the album. The lyrics of the entire CD follow around the concepts of blasphemy and destroying Christ/Christianity. I have absolutely no problem with these lyrics (I'm not exactly a very religious man myself), but the concept does get old after awhile. After about the third song of hearing about Christ rotting, the idea does get a little old. But as I've said before, lyrics don't necessarily make or break an album for me; although I never hold it against a band if they really want to wow me with some insightful and interesting lyrics. As I mentioned above, this album contains really brutal and fast guitar riffing, but also some really slow doom-style stuff too. The slow riffing is really standout in songs like Misanthropic Indulgence and Uprising Heresy. Despite the fact that they slow to a crawl, most actually are quite enthralling. I usually tend to enjoy my music more mid to fast paced, but it's not written in stone. Kyle Severn does a solid job behind the kit. He really helps add to that ominous feel given by much of the guitars with some great double kick parts like in the song Deciever. Mike Saez throws pretty much the basic death growl at you. His voice is nothing to get too excited about in my book although it's not bad by any means either. My one real complaint with this album is the production. The band has been around for over ten years now, and you think they could throw one album out there with some decent production. As I understand it, this is some of the best production they've had with their recent albums so I'd hate to hear what their old stuff sounds like. Production like this in this day in age is inexcusable. The guitars are really muddy, the harmonics never really hit their full potential, and the overall feel is very primitive and raw. I know some people out there just don't think its metal unless it sounds like it's been recorded in a YMCA shower room (this is most apparent with Black Metal bands), but come on guys, good production never hurt anyone. I know some bands just can't afford, or aren't given the studio time to really turn out a good product, but despite that, the technology is out there to get a better recording than this. Other than that last complaint this is a pretty good album, it's just too bad the experience is marred by the bad production. To me there are no real stand out tracks, and this particular album doesn't necessarily make me want to dig into Incantation's back catalogue, but I have a feeling I'll give it a spin every now and than for good measure.

Release Details

Incantation

Blasphemy

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