Friday, January 18, 2013

Terminate - Ascending To Red Heavens [2013]


It seems that the majority of current death metal cannibals have established a single, extensive portal into Sweden and the USA circa 1988-1992, and what's more is that only a fragment of these bands, captivated by their olden grotesques and incubators are able to shift into a slightly more modern, sensible form of death metal on which to both exorcise and enlarge the ideas who's footings were founded by giants such as Dismember, Autopsy, Entombed, Pestilence, and so forth. Truly, is there no way to diminish this portal? Closing it entirely would be preposterous, as even the most modern-headed death metal headbanger requires an certain proportion of archaic gore and filth, but perhaps re-sizing could indeed prove efficient, so that bands could harness from influences both old and new, therefore, revitalizing the genre's fundamentals and, at the same time stirring it with a dash from the origins. That seems like a wonderful idea, yet there is one tiny hindrance.

We don't possess the portal's key.

Thus, this leads us to yet another act who's motto is chainsaws and bloodied murk; Terminate. In all honesty, I'm one of the lesser scoffers of this OSDM revival. I've enjoyed a copious quantity of such acts as Chapel of Disease, Feral, Evocation, Hail Of Bullets, Banished From Inferno, Entrails, etc, to a certain frivolous extent, and I still do, as you can see. Terminate isn't actually a newcomer to my spacious array of acts, as I've been acquainted with the Illinois four-piece ever since the release of their EP ''Thirst For The Obscene'', which was a ravenous, competent mash of typically busy, atonal chainsaw guitars and now the group has an even larger stock pf ammunition in their hands; a debut through the death/grind entrepreneurs Selfmadegod Records. Terminate, despite the blatancy of their influences, put out a solid performance here, with uproarious guitars that have trebled in murkiness since their EP, flushing into standard tremolo-laced Swedish death metal riffing, but at the same time, the band likes to discover somewhat different paths every now and then, revisiting Autopsy, as made evident of the sheer depth of the vocals colliding with more spidery guitar lurches, Terrorizer, and even, to my surprise, some Finnish culprits such as Convulse or Abhorrence. Sure, it's rare, but I did like tinging brood of Finnish dourness, haunting the Dismember-esque tremolos.

The band is also fairly potent in infusing their squalid testament with a pinch of musical elegance. That's why I hear a little bit of early Pestilence buried in there, but naturally, the band's foremost ideology is to cultivate densely packed chainsaw apertures, which have an even grindcore-like momentum to them, pretty much like the recent Humanity Delete, only more sludgy. And I suppose John Porada's vocal presence is noteworthy enough, as he exhales a better low-register vocal spurt than many of his kin. ''Ascending To Red Heavens'' is just another bulk of regurgitating disgust that showers us with puke and ghastliness the millionth time, but still does not fail to generate a completely robust formula, one who's portal's function has been fixated long ago. I suppose Terminate are just another act who'd rather bend the knee and continue to shred bodies with crude chainsaws, rather than some of the most renowned OSDM death metal groups out there. Worth a good many runs if you're hungry for bones and flesh, and quite solid otherwise.

Highlights:
Answered In Lead
Numb
Rotten Dead Mass

Rating: 75%

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