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August 29, 2008 |
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01. Judgement Defiled
02. Fatal Inequity
03. Full Term Refuse
04. Insanity Of The Obsessed
05. Suppression Of Heresy
06. Fragmented Salvation
07. Climatic Annhilation
08. Out Of Death
09. induction
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Bear with me for a moment of digression, because this must be said. Deathquake Records: You are shooting yourselves in the proverbial foot. Some of you Metal readers and all Metal writers are aware of the good ole voice over anti-piracy approach that some record labels incorporate into their promos, in this case: "You are listening to the new WARFACE album-'Insanity Of The Obsessed' out now on Deathquake Records." Now, as a writer, listening to this is irritating as hell because they don't even stop the music as they're rambling the same repetitive bile 2-3 times on each and every damn song, so not only are they driving you insane with their drivel, they're severely impeding your ability to hear the music they so desperately want you to promote for them.
Sometimes you're dealing with a band that will potentially sell up to several hundred thousand units, so if nothing else there's a logical business reason why the voice over is present. BUT - how many people have heard of Deathquake Records? How many people have heard of WARFACE? Few, very few; so we as writers are faced with a decent band (and WARFACE certainly seem to be decent) that we can hardly absorb, let alone write about, because their songs average only three minutes in length and their clueless record label is rendering approximately 16 seconds of each song utterly useless thanks to this retarded voice over. With songs that short, this imbecilic approach hurts a band big time; as an upstart Brutal Death Metal band, you're struggling enough as is, and your record label rendering 1/3 of your material useless is not going to encourage those that promote Metal to try to pick the good stuff from between this nauseating repetition. Keep it in perspective, Deathquake-if you want the Metal media to help you and bands, let us hear the friggin' music!
That said, from what I can actually discern about WARFACE's music, it really is decent: Glass gargling, throat shredding growls that are truly brutal, great chugging tempos and structuring in the vein of OBITUARY and BENEDICTION, and some exceptional riffery and soloing courtesy of lone guitarist Laura Christine. That's right, the guitarist is a woman, and she's not just dishing out hollow, wanna-be bar chord fakery ala KITTIE and others. In truth, the fact that she's a woman should have nothing to do with it. Yes, it's great to hear a woman shredding up an entire fret board as opposed to 2 strings and maybe 3 frets, but the bottom line is the shredding itself, and it's good. Obviously Laura draws her influences from the truly brutal in the Death Metal world, and she's certainly a guitar Jedi in the making if I've ever heard one. Tunes like "Fatal Inequity" and "Fragmented Salvation" carry some solid musicianship and some exceptional solos courtesy of Laura, and should tickly your Death Metal fancy.
However, you're not going to hear anything new or even remotely distinct on "Insanity Of The Obsessed"; but if you give it the chance and look past what might seem at first to be a stale, overworked gimmick by having a female guitarist, the brutalist in you is bound to be contented and somewhat impressed by the music on display. As a band, certainly WARFACE could do much to grow and improve upon their sound, but as it is "Insanity Of The Obsessed" is a listenable album…or at least it should be without the record label's unnecessary interference.
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