EXHUMED - Death Revenge

October 13, 2017, 6 years ago

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Greg Pratt

Rating: 8.5

review black death exhumed

EXHUMED - Death Revenge

This is Exhumed's most far-reaching effort yet, Death Revenge—the band's sixth full-length—being a concept album of sorts, or, as the press material accompanying the album says, “a musical melodrama in thirteen parts.” The plot is perfect for this band: it's set in Edinburgh in the 1820s and follows a series of murders where the victims' bodies were sold to anatomists, while also touching on the underground grave-robbery trade. But, look, don't be scared with this talk of concept and plot: Death Revenge is still Exhumed and it still, more or less, sounds like Exhumed. So, you can expect top-notch and well-crafted melodic gore metal, the band dipping into the well of classic death and grindcore, as always. 

So, songs like openers “Defenders Of The Grave” and “Lifeless” and the closing title track sound familiar, but there are points on the album that show the band growing. Most notably, there's “The Anatomy Act Of 1832”, an instrumental which clocks in at 7:29 and finds the members of Exhumed taking their time to create atmosphere that eventually explodes into a guitar-blazing fury, Exhumed guitarist/vocalist Matt Harvey's love of thrash classics coming through loud and clear here, the song sounding like a classic Metallica instrumental in more ways than one. It's an incredible step ahead for the band, and songs like “Dead End” also show Exhumed stretching out a bit, with a dark groove and a melodic '80s-throwback solo (granted, not Exhumed's first); “Unspeakable” is trad metal filtered through death. Death Revenge is more than just another great Exhumed album; with these new elements added to their sound, it's one of their best albums.



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