乐队列表 Brutal Death Enmity (USA) Illuminations of Vile Engorgement

For an album that's considered polarizing, I'm astounded as to just how neutral I am towards the whole thing. It's certainly not the worst death metal I've heard but then again it's not the best either. It just sort of exists in this death metal limbo where nothing really happens. Enmity are certainly unflinchingly brutal, probably the heaviest band I've thus far come across, but shit I'd be lying if I said this was interesting or entertaining, it's just kind of there.

If you're on the bands page I'm going to assume you have a basic idea of what Enmity sounds like. Ultra distorted death metal with very little riffs broken apart by breakdowns whilst a vocal delivers a constant pig squeal. Yeah it's certainly brutal as hell and there's no melody on display here. Guitars just play constant grinding whilst the drums are constantly blasting even during the breakdowns. Brutality for brutalities sake is what Enmity has aimed for and they've certainly delivered, but apart from that, nothing happens.

I'm being serious, for an album that's supposedly the heaviest thing of all time I'm surprised at just how static the whole affair is. If you can get past the production then you'll realize the guitars are solely comprised of chugging riffs. Despite the fast nature of the record it's ludicrously simple. There's no variety between tracks, nothing really to break it up with the exception of that useless ambient interlude halfway through.

I find it strange actually, there's nothing really to enjoy about Illuminations of Vile Engorgement but I can't find anything to complain about it either. It's just sort of there, it doesn't really piss me off or annoy me or anything, I'm just kind of like "this is sort of cool...I guess." It's certainly the emptiest death metal I've heard, probably the album closest to the genres general aesthetics. The band has created something very close to the alien, inhospitable nature of death itself. Whilst other death metal bands offered at the very least some semblance of humanity, Enmity offer up something monochrome and bleak.

Due to the strange nature of this album it's probably been the hardest review I've had to write. Enmity don't really offer an album to be enjoyed, rather, this is more of an experience. Illuminations of Vile Engorgement is certainly more about the aura the music creates than the actual music itself. The instrumentation seems to be second to the atmosphere the band was aiming for. There's no real musical direction on here, no real riffs. I might have heard a solo, I think, and the ambient interlude does help to break up the endless, monotonous blasting, but apart from that it's very still, static music that doesn't really go anywhere.

I think I like the idea of the album a whole lot more than the end result, I respect the bands efforts to take death metal to its logical extreme and the brutality is certainly something to behold. But apart from the obvious, this is just a really uninteresting, lifeless album that strives for nothing except sheer brutality. For some people this would be a ringing endorsement, but for me, I don't really see a point.