Paganizer had one more album in the pipeline.
Freshly signed to XTreem Music, Rogga Johansson (guitar/vocals, Carve, Dead Sun, Eye of Purgatory, Furnace, Massacre, Megascavenger, Revolting, Ribspreader… ), Matthias Fiebig (drums, Blodsrit, Carve, ex-Ribspreader), Martin Klasén (bass) and Kjetil Lynghaug (guitar, Heir Corpse One, Stass, Ribspreader…) honor their contract with Transcending Obscurity Records for the release of Flesh Requiem, the band’s thirteenth album.
When we talk about Paganizer, we’re talking about one of Sweden’s most prolific bands, who have remained true to their Swedish roots ever since their first demo 26 years ago. This so-called “chainsaw” sound created by the HM-2, which is still rampant and accompanied by its vociferations, remains in my humble opinion one of the most effective on the market, and which the band will of course exploit to hit us with all its might. While the first two tracks, Life of Decay and Meat Factory, immediately display a highly aggressive and fast-paced approach, the musicians are also capable of creating a heavier atmosphere on the slow-burning Flesh Requiem, where heady leads take the lead, but which still offers a few livelier passages. A little feint with the calm introduction to Hunger For Meat, but the track is short and unmistakable: it’s based on pure violence, just like Viking Supremacy, which follows suit with waves of devastating fury. World Scythe repeats these jerky patterns tinged with heady harmonics and worked leads, but the drums take over again to lead us to the final sample, then to Fare Thee Well (Burn In Hell), which surprises no one by turning to explosive passages to pace its rage. The onslaught continues at a similar pace on Necromonolithic, but the choruses let the vocals take over before returning to good old-school blast with The Pyroclastic Excursions, which still leaves an interesting place for leads in its fast-paced riffs. The bludgeoning continues with Just Another Doomsday, which doesn’t abandon its original recipe, but spices it up with more imposing bursts before the brief melancholy touch of Suffer Again, broken by its violence, but the band still finds a way to bring it back to life thanks to the guitars before closing the album with Skeletons, deploying as much its roots used throughout the album as the hints of Heavy Metal in the sharp solos.
Paganizer continues to reign supreme in Swedish-style Death with an unchanged recipe, and the band is definitely master of it. Flesh Requiem offers another 40-minute fix, with absolutely no downtime. A real success.
95/100
