Diabolic
Excisions Of Exorcisms
6
2001's Vengeance Ascending was one of the first CDs I ever reviewed, and it just seems like these Floridian death metallers won't go away, despite a forgetful, if 'try hard' catalog of albums. I guess I should give the band credit for being either stubborn or dedicated, and even more so for reforming 7 years after their last effort, Infinity Through Purification -- which, I admit, I never heard.
Despite their best efforts and consistent, tight Tampa sound, Diabolic, even with Antar "Blastmaster" Coates on drums (also of Unholy Ghost and Blastmasters, and who never seemed to rise into Tony Yeung and Tony Laureano reverence despite his skill), Excisions of Exorcisms is a by-the-numbers, processed and second-tier Floridian death metal effort.
Culling from the obvious Floridian sound (Cannibal Corpse, Deicide, Malevolent Creation etc) but with a little more Krisiun -ish mindless speed thrown in, the album blasts -- they do have Blastmaster on drums after all -- and squeals from start to finish with nary a moment of respite -- or memorability. It's straight from the interbreeding, oversaturated, faster-is-better speed race that inundated US death metal in the late 90s/early 00s (Divine Empire, Divine Rapture, Unholy Ghost, Internecine, Pessimist, Aurora Borealis, etc), and it essentially belongs there -- even the cover. Not that the album is terrible; it's got a typical clean punchy Floridian production, feral snarling vocals and some tight musicianship. But these parts simply come together to form something rather forgetful.
For virtually all of the album's 35-minute run time, it's breakneck no holds barred blast beats, with Coates rarely deviating from a full-on assault. Guitarists Jeff Parrish and Kelly McLauchlin (Pessimist) provide lots of frantic, chaotic solos, but Trey Azagthoth they are not. Even with a couple of typically 90s atmospherics (i.e. "Infernal Darkness"), tracks like "Hellish World", "Venomous Habitations", "Evil in Disguise" and "Fragmented Kreation" just bleed together into one long blasting vortex of speed. A couple of moments perk my ears up such as the blackened ""Bloodwashed", which could be a Council of the Fallen/Order of Ennead track, or the album's lone slow cut "False Belief", but these are mired in the rest of the album's purely blasting banality .
Granted, there's probably an audience for this type of death metal, the same people that brought every release on JL America Records in the 90s, but in today's day and age, Diabolic are a little more redundant than they were a decade ago, and there's a reason they never rose to the levels of their Floridian peers.
Related
DiabolicInfinity Through Purification
11/18/2003