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Incantation: The forsaken mourning of angelic anguish
31/03/09 || Daemonomania
Wow, what an album title. Let’s break it down here: someone is mourning the anguish of angels, but that mourning is being forsaken by somebody else. Confusing, right? Metal bands, whenever you have of in a song title, and it isn’t immediately followed by the word DEATH, there’s gonna be a problem. Chances are the whole thing will sound slapped together and won’t make sense. Only Suffocation can have titles like “Epitaph of the credulous” and not sound silly.
And the song titles don’t get much better as you delve further into FMAA, like what the fuck is up with “Twisted sacrilegious journey into the darkest neurotic delirium”? Would the band Journey have been cooler if they were twisted and sacrilegious? Most likely. Imagine, if you will, the cheese meets evil power of “Don’t stop believing (in the power of the Shuggoth).” That shit would tear up the charts and your soul.
Anyway, track names aside we all know that Incantation is no joke. They’ve had 400 million long haired dudes cycle in and out of the band, but remain an underground force of punishing, doom-infused, downtuned death metal. This EP reaches back for some of the band’s older material, throws in some newer shit, and Relapse tacked some bonus tracks onto the end. All that cribbing has produced a full-length album, but one of the major downsides to FMAA is that it feels like a compilation and not like a statement of forsaken angelic mourning concerning the whereabouts of misanthropic demonic simulacra.
The various sources from whence this material was compiled probably means that 38 bandmembers were involved in recording, but we all know who the main crew is and always will be. Mr. McEntree does the guitar and bass thing, and he lays down a wall of sick riffs and sludgy pain with the best of ‘em. As does the hardworking Kyle Severn on drums – he can make the transition between polka blasting, thrashing, and funereal plodding at championship levels. Then we’ve got the perfectly vomitous vocals of Craig Pillard, who you’ll recognize from Evoken. Masterful stuff indeed.
Despite the lack of coherence, with talent like that on board Incantation always pumps out some nifty shit. The first several tracks blend in a bit, but ridiculously-entitled “Lusting congregation of perpetual damnation (eternal Eden)” churns into chunky double bass assault mode before veering into a slow pinch-harmonic ridden doomy abyss. The Death cover is nicely done, and “Blissful bloodshower” is a funny interlude but a poor substitute for an actual shower involving water. First and foremost is “The ibex moon” though – not sure if this is a cover or not but Incantation’s rendition of it is so slow and gooey and horrifying that it instantly enters my Death Metal Top 10 Tunes of All Time of the Anguish of Not Having A Delicious Plate of Nachos Right Now. In the doom/death Olympics where the death is far more dominant, “The ibex moon” pole vaulted into the long jump while throwing a discus.
So yeah, if you like your death metal with a primitive vibe, a wealth of brutal slow sections, and a penchant for buggery then step right up. However, the piecemeal manner by which everything was thrown together does hurt FMAA’s listenability.
Therefore, I give it 6.5 revocations of scores given of lusting denominations of eternally blissful golden showers out of 10.
- Information
- Released: 1997
- Label: Repulse originally, Relapse reissued
- Website: www.incantation.com
- Band
- Craig Pillard: session vocals
- John McEntee: guitars, bass
- Kyle Severn: drums
- Daniel Corchado: bass on 8-11
- Tracklist
- 01. Shadows From the Ancient Empire
- 02. Lusting Congregation of Perpetual Damnation (Eternal Eden)
- 03. Triumph in Blasphemy (Interlude)
- 04. The Forsaken Mourning of Angelic Anguish
- 05. Scream Bloody Gore (Death cover)
- 06. Twisted Sacrilegious Journey Into the Darkest Neurotic Delirium
- 07. Outro
- 08. The Ibex Moon
- 09. Blasphemous Cremation
- 10. Essence Ablaze
- 11. Blissful Bloodshower
