I was under absolutely no illusions as to what I was letting myself in for when I picked up this album. Let’s face it, there was no way that a band called Architectural Genocide woould be releasing a concept album on sunshine and rainbows, that’s for sure! No, this is an absolutely gut-wrenchingly brutal piece of death metal savagery that would scare your parents and convince your grandmother that you’re sacrificing virgins in the back garden. I feel like I’ve been trampled by a stampede of armour clad elephants within minutes of starting this album which means that it’s doing everything it set out to do, there’s a slim chance that I’m going to make it through this album without experiencing some serious injury… probably whiplash.
Texas has always been pretty well known for things on the more extreme side, hell just look at some of the food at the state fairs. But this, this is some fucking seriosly extreme brutal death metal. There’s blast beats galore, ridiculous shredding and an almost demonic guttural growling from vocalist Daniel Brockway. It’s an almost punishing experience that pummels you to death from start to finish and if you’re searching out brutal death metal then this is exactly what you want. For the relative new kids on the block releasing their debut album, Architectiural Genocide have already cracked the formula for delivering aural punishment of the next degree. If you’re reading this and thinking “gosh, that sounds simply awful”, then I suggest you just walk away now because this is not for you.
I’ll admit that from a personal taste, when we head into the more brutal side of death metal, I often find that bands can be a bit hit and miss for me. Take Cannibal Corpse for example, I’ve really never understood the hype and to be honest they just don’t do it for me at all. Whereas Architectural Genocide manage to appeal to me more and i’m not quite sure what it is that makes them stand out as much it just seems a little more… grown up perhaps? Like if Cannibal Corpse is for teenagers, AG would be for adults who have their shit together (well a bit anyway) but still want to feel brutal as fuck.
Tracks such as ‘Dominate and Proliferate’ and ‘Pleasure Induced by Agony’ pull no punches with their attacks, and cover just the right amount of gore and brutality without seeming over the top and almost juvenile like some other bands in the genre (I’m looking at you ‘I Cum Blood’). This album even has a track about my favourite subject at the moment, ‘The Abolishment of Human Existence’ which is every bit as heavy, nasty and punishing as the other seven tracks. It pummels its way through over 5 minutes of serious heavy shit with Brockway’s guttural growls boring their way into your very soul while the rest of the band chip away at the rest of your body with their relentless rhythms.
This was sold as a “not a listening experience you will walk away from unsscathed” and the sheer brutality of Cordyceptic Anthropomorph lives up to that statement and then some. This won’t be for everyone, in fact there’s a fairly niche market for this compared to some of the albums that I’ve listened to recently. But in that niche, this album could quickly become pretty dominant. It’s unlikely to be an album I’ll listen to all the time, but it could definitely worm its way into the “work has been an absolute dick” playlist.
- ‘Cordyceptic Anthropomorph’ is out now. You can get your copy HERE.
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