Ελληνικά
Last Updated on 12:49 AM by Giorgos Tsekas
Genre: Death Metal/Grindcore
Country: U.S.A.
Label: Relapse Records
Year: 2019
I’m really sick and tired when I watch sterilized and outside real life creations to be considered as Art, as well as the elite or pseudo elite to convince us that they are the only ones that can understand real Art. I also wonder when will finally people stop saying shitty things like “grindcore isn’t music man, it is just noise” and other familiar nonsense. We fuckin’ love death metal and grindcore, so we love music=Art, so let’s deal with one of its problems.
One of the hardest things in Art, is to depict one form of one of the seven (or nine as many now days claim) arts in another. A sculpture like Aphrodite of Milos how would it is musically imprinted? Or what poem could ever adequately render a painting by René Magritte? Lots of examples, but I think you got it. I mean imagine the difficulty of moving from cinema and a movie with many close ups or gros-plans to choreography or how to make something architecturally encompassing the linguistic richness of John Steinbeck’s books? Not that this is unlikely or impossible. I focus on the difficulty of analogous arguments and how not every notation system can be attributed to the other and whether it is achieved in some other form. On the other hand, music that is the most personal of all the arts, and perhaps the most human, in terms of defining one’s personality as well as the percentage of humanity that has access and attachment to it, may come closer to another form of art. After all, the soundtrack of a performance or movie or reading a poem or book under the sounds of music is a daily occurrence, almost a rule, and without the commitment of a complete imprint, one of the features that one chooses music over another art form is purely subjective.
Exhumed may have already reached their ninth studio album, but probably haven’t been bothered by that kind of thinking, ever. After all, a 24/7 open human butcher’s musical liner is not Art in the conservative / traditional sense of the term, but Art even though not so sophisticated, indeed. But again, aren’t you pissed off with all these pussies that grew up in colleges with expensive picture frames in their rooms rather than metal posters, with French and piano, and bloodshed the masses, when they sit in a chair and define our lives?
Exhumed, on the other hand, did not grow up with Oscar-winning pseudo-cultural cinema, but with rented ‘80s videotapes with splatter, gore themes and sometimes psychological, social and class analysis (as in Carpenter masterpieces) that formed their aesthetics. In their previous album, Death Revenge, we were fascinated, when their lyrics were dealing with crimes committed in Edinburgh, Scotland in 1800, creating their first concept album. Now we go back in to the 1980s and its low-budget films that haunted our youth and entertained us in our childhood and adolescence. At this point it would be a good idea to put together a list of movies of that specific era, that could be a good guide for those who have never been in this bout or to remember their burnt out and violent pastimes. But maybe we will do it in a future separate article, since we haven’t wrote any word about the album!!!
Musically speaking “Horror” has an even more aggressive approaching, lasting less than 30 minutes while it features 15 songs with more straightforward direction and one-dimensional structure than their previous effort. 15 rumbling songs with some notable Slayer-isque guitar goodies and tight playing, “Horror” is the album you put on your stereo on Monday morning before going to work to make sure you don’t need your lawyer in the next 8 hours or when you want to smash everything with old-school sound from the 90’s. Let me emphasize here on the fact that Exhumed manages to sound fresh and modern and at the same time nostalgic to older ones without sounding outdated or retro.
Without being overloaded, “Horror” still has a plethora of information and sweet, addictive noise in a very short time, so it’s hard to get bored or discern any repetitive patterns or spots, though these are there, but the final result is so amusing, that there’s no room for moaning here. But there is room for three more, extra songs as a bonus in a certain edition, so those who really dig this VHS ode to slaughter, prefer this one.
Highlights: “Ravenous Cadavers”, “The Red Death”, “Ripping Death”, “Naked, Screaming, and Covered In Blood”.
