Cannibal Corpse is ready to dismember you.
You all know this band created in 1988, known for both extremely violent artworks and music. Nowadays composed of Paul Mazurkiewicz (drums), Alex Webster (bass, Blotted Science, Conquering Dystopia), Rob Barrett (guitar, ex-Malevolent Creation), George « Corpsegrinder » Fisher (vocals, Paths of Possession, Serpentine Dominion, Voodoo Gods, ex-Monstrosity) and Erik Rutan (guitar, Hate Eternal, ex-Morbid Angel), the band releases Violence Unimagined, its fifteenth album.
The band begins with Murderous Rampage, a brutal and fast song since the beginning. Cannibal Corpse offers Old School and bloody riffs as usual, surmounted by devastating howlings, before leaving for Necrogenic Resurrection. The song is very greasy, very effective and extremely heavy, taking advantage of energy spurts to offer tearing leads, according to their new bandmate’s abilities. Inhumane Harvest, the song used to introduce the album, is next, and that’s with a fast-paced rhythmic that draws from the band’s Old School roots that it comes to life. Impossible not to headbang on this one, like on Condemnation Contagion, another very hooking song. Bloody, raw and as heavy as technical, the band gives the best of itself to offer an impressive sound. We go back to this technical and greasy groove with Surround, Kill, Devour, one of the songs that will probably be on the band’s every setlists when live shows will be back. Effective, thick and violent, a simple and massive chorus, it’s high-level Cannibal Corpse!
We immediately continue with the bloody Ritual Annihilation, a composition that reminds me the band’s firsts releases, with this obvious mix between Old School and modern tones that invokes the most impure violence before leaving for Follow the Blood after an energetic lead. Dissonance, pure brutality and massive Old School groove that will break necks, while Blood and Burned offers an as chaotic an impressive technicality, that suddenly bursts into fire thanks to some leads, while Slowly Sawn reminds us the old Cannibal Corpse, as greasy and aggressive as possible, topped by some sharp leads. We go back to pure and unchained violence with Overtorture, a song that literally annihilates any kind of delicacy with crude and heavy riffs as well as a roaring bass before Cerements of the Flayed, the final track. Last song, last opportunity for the band to crush us, and that’s with an as greasy as a bucket of oil groove that the band drops its most violent riffs.
Cannibal Corpse’s longevity is rooted into violence, and it is far from drying up! Violence Unimagined offers Old School songs, technical parts and greasy riffs, proving that the band keeps increasing its recipe with new elements, without denying its foundations.
95/100