Zombiefication - Below the Grief (2018)

If I received only middling returns from the band's 2014 album Procession Through Infestation, that only highlights even more how much of a surprise Below the Grief has proven. Trace elements of their Swedish-derived death metal sound might persist throughout this fourth Zombiefication full-length, but on the whole it's far enough removed from the roots of their sound that it's easy to count it as the most unique they've ever produced. A hammering helping of death metal fundamentals fueled by anger and towering walls of melodic force, helmed by passionate vocals which seem like the singer was just crawling and dragging home from some violent altercation in which he received a number of bruises and cuts. It's also exciting, and unlike its well-produced predecessor, far less of a predictable experience...simple but effective riffs would just burst out of the landscape everywhere and keep me glued to my earbuds as I awaited what would come next.

It's actually a little daunting to describe...like a jarring mesh of death metal, thrash and hardcore with an overall atmosphere birthed from the sheer savagery of its motion. The drumming is extremely loud and crashy, albeit not so much that you can't make out whatever else is happening. This was actually one slight little hangup for me, I think they could have turned those down just a fraction. The bass lines are propulsive and groovy, and the rhythm guitars create this sonic envelope which is aggressive but constantly oozing out desperate or sad, if not entirely creative melodies. To that extent it feels like a natural progression from the album before it, only the way the whole picture comes together here seems much more fresh. The vocals range a little higher before, bloodthirsty and raving grunts and howls which almost feel like he's being slapped in the midsection by 2 x 4 boards while he's in the studio booth barking them out. Lastly, they incorporate these little unexpected twists, like the cleaner breaks in "Deliverance from the Astral Sea", or the tribal, clanging, evil intro to the following track called "Echoes of Light". When that chug rolls in off the beat and then they hit those patterns of interchanging chords it feels like the group has turned over an incredible new musical leaf.

And at that point they're only a short way into the album, interesting ideas persist throughout all the tunes. Below the Grief has a really compelling contrast between thundering unrest and melancholy, and reaches a higher bar of craftsmanship and songwriting than any of their albums before it. The production might have a few flaws for a lot of listeners; it's not quite at the level of the album before it, for which of the mix was the forte, but the ingenuity and emotion manifest here is just so much cooler. I'm not saying it's the most memorable album you'll hear lately, but it's clearly inspired. An effort I could see myself recommending not only to classic death metal fans, or 'death 'n roll' addicts who enjoy records like Entombed's Uprising and Inferno, but also to fans of crushing sludge, or Chaos A.D.-like groove metal, or even metallic hardcore acts like Ringworm or Integrity. It cultivates a worthwhile cross-section of ideas, without ever playing them out cheap, and it also signifies a lot more risk than Zombiefication's backlog, which despite the novel geographical origin could have just fit in snugly with a lot of other old-school Swede-loving tributes. Sometimes you take the chance, you roll the dice and come out with a critical hit, and that's what Misters Hitchcock and Jacko have done here, and it's exciting. Well done.

Verdict: Win [8/10] 

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Zombiefication - Procession Through Infestation (2014)

Although they possess a whole ton of the elements that make for a Swedish death metal worship band, drowning in nostalgia for those early 90s classics ala Left Hand Path, Dark Recollections, Like an Everflowing Stream, and Clandestine, I thought it was interesting to watch the development of Zombiefication, being one of the rare Central American bands to adopt that sound, whereas so many of their peers are straight from Europe. And truth be hold, there was a sizable payoff when the band's 2013 sophomore full-length At the Caves of Eternal proved a notable improvement over their 2010 debut Midnight Stench in every category: the production, the musicianship, the songwriting potential. Fairly hot on the heels of that record, they released Procession Through Infestation, and it's an effort I'm rather split on, thinking they've once again made a formidable leap forward in one area while not exactly delivering in others...

I'll lead in with the production, which I found absolutely fantastic and the high point of this disc. As a band so thickly rooted in that old, raucous, heavy Entombed aesthetic, I loved how hugely it comes across on the recording. The rhythm guitars are potent and crashing, the bass corpulent with just the right amount of boom and buzz to stand out solidly in the mix. Drums are raw and snappy, cultivating a very live feel that works nicely with the sheer impact of those rhythms. 'Mr. Hitchcock''s vocals are likewise praiseworthy, massive and grotesque and never content to simply emulate themselves, the guy is always reaching deeply into his gut for another Petrov-ian howl or guttural sustain. The higher pitched melodic guitars here are also a nice touch, showing a clear influence not only from those most foremost Swedish legends, but also bands like At the Gates, Desultory and Edge of Sanity, and they never lay them on too thickly, affixing them to the meatier undercarriage of the rhythm in a perfectly bloody marriage. In fact, the way those melancholic or gloomy melodies interact with the other components reminds me a lot of the last two Tribulation albums, only more brute, less elegant.

Sadly, for all the glory of their carnal presentation, the songs and riff choices here really did not stick to me whatsoever. The chord patterns and melodies are all sort of average, without any standouts or climactic surprises waiting around any corner of the catacombs. The album is like wandering through a low-to-mid level dungeon and fighting the same monster in 8-10 different chambers, rather than slowly building towards that climactic boss battle. There were hooks I was invisibly hearing in my head that just never manifest, and while the sound of this record does do a lot to compensate when cranked out at high volumes, I just become too bored as I realize the musical progressions here are slightly bland. To be fair, there's occasionally a little clamor or unpredictable start/stop when they setup a track, but once you're out into the proper depths of the piece, it just becomes a little too repetitious; not that they're using the same chords or phrases over and over, just that it doesn't go through a series of emotional peaks and valleys, rather just stays on a level plane. It's an issue I take with a few of their European counterparts like Revel in Flesh (who they've done a split with) or a handful of Rogga's projects. Well-produced, well-intentioned, just not terribly memorable.

Verdict: Indifference [6.75/10] (we resurrect from tears)

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Zombiefication - At the Caves of Eternal (2013)

Mexico's grave robbers Zombiefication had already begun the process of distinguishing themselves from the majority of Swedeath wannabes with their debut Midnight Stench, but it was hardly a gem of an album, so they're making up for that with the sophomore At the Caves of Eternal, which I would dub a dramatic improvement. I daresay I've been hearing an exhausting number of such old school throwback sounds over the course of the past 5 years, and the 'cool' factor is starting to wear thin, but there's still a decent percentage of them arriving, and we can now add this band to that list, because even if it borrows here or there, At the Caves of Eternal is good fun with depth, variety, and perhaps most importantly, a memorable atmosphere.

This is definitely the 'darker' variety of Entombed worship, the sort that makes you feel like you've fallen into a crypt on a landslide of cemetery soil and worms. Comparable to a Miasmal or Tormented. However, heavily melodic patterns run concurrent to the burgeoning rhythm guitars, and the Mexicans do a pretty bang up job of delivering haunted note progressions that make you feel like you're in some idealized horror flick. The riffs here are not always unique, but neither are they just borrowed wholesale from the usual suspects. For instance, there is a grooving, low end pattern in "Disembodied Souls" that draws heavily on a beat from old Celtic Frost. But the Mexicans conjure a number of dynamic shifts through the album that render it an excellent example of pacing. Tunes like "In the Shadowed Garden" make an almost innovative, hypnotic use of tremolo patterns before erupting into the expected, obsidian d-beats. The texturing and layering of the two rhythm guitars in tandem is voluptuous, along with the bass playing, and it just feels like the hungry undead holding an orgy and smearing dirt over one another.

Vocals are a harsh bark, drawing a bit on Chris Reifert or L-G Petrov, but not at all derivative to the point they become annoying. I love it when they're barking out and leaving shadowy echoes hovered over the rhythm section...like a haze of swamp gas. Drums are good and loud, but not enough that they crunch out the guitar playing, which is important, since there are about a half dozen excellent melodies interspersed across the album, including the titular opener. The leads aren't incredibly complex, but they wail away with a bluesy, messy abandon that hearkens back to the Entombed death & roll days. But where At the Caves of Eternal works most is in how well put together it is. The slower and faster tracks combine to create a morbid and apocryphal emotional response, and you can tell these riffs weren't all derivative enough to betray the clear amount of effort being exerted. It's not perfect, but it's definitely a solid step ahead of the debut, and an effort I'd recommend to the obvious cult audience swallowing this style up in the new century (they obviously do exist, or else I doubt the labels would be putting forth so much of this). Good on Zombiefication.

Verdict: Win [7.75/10]

http://www.zombiefication.com/

Zombiefication - Midnight Stench (2010)

Despite the lack of constituents breaking out in popularity beyond the country's borders, Mexican metal has always been a very busy scene, with dozens of bands exploring nearly every sub-genre you could dream of. Black, Gothic, death, thrash, traditional heavy metal, it's all been done south of the US border, but Zombiefication might be a first for me: a Mexican band with a tone straight out of the early 90s Swedish death metal scene. Big, chugging guitars laden in that all too familiar tone, and resonant but dim vocals reminiscent of L-G Petrov at his most caustic. Midnight Stench is the band's debut, and it features a lot of dense thrash-like rhythms and a pervasive, dark mood that places it alongside other 'old is new' acts like Brutally Deceased, Maim and Tormented.

I'm not going to claim I enjoyed this album as much as any of those I just listed, but if I can give some credit here it will be for the varied tempos. Many of the retro Swedish ghouls utilize a lot of repeated, paraphrased riffing patterns from Left Hand Path, but Mr. Jacko and Mr. Hitch, the two central zombies here, engage in a lot of slower, churning material that is adequate for pit fighting, like the bridge/latter half of "Anthem to the Deathmarch" or the atmospheric, doomed and haunted walls of "Sleepless Mutter" which is easily one of the most engrossing pieces here. I also enjoy a few of the riffs in "Last Resting Place", "Hitchcock Screaming in Phobia" and perhaps even the mindless wailing and storming of "The Early Years", which is as close as the album gets to sheer Entombed worship.

But then, there are also a few duds here which break up the pace and immersion in the album: "Cryptic Broadcast", "Jacko's Funeral Pyre", "Broken Gravestone" and "Necroambulatory" don't have much going for them outside of their authentic, soiled guitar tones. The vocals retain their bloodied bludgeon pitch throughout the whole playlist, but they're all too rarely configured into a memorable pattern (save "Sleepless Mutter"), and the rhythm section just sits its duff on the backburner, ample and aggressive enough to carry the guitars, but never distinguishing itself independently for a more full-bodied assault. Midnight Stench is not a bad record, if you enjoy the proto-death of Sweden in all its forms, and it's interesting to see the influence such a style has held outside of Europe or the States, but I think these Mexicans need a few better riffs to catapult them further into the rank and file of nostalgia addicts that devour this brand of death.

Verdict: Indifference [6.5/10]

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