Humangled - Fractal
Abyss Records
Death Metal
10 songs (40:14)
Release year: 2010
Reviewed by Steve

What on Earth could these guys possibly mean naming a song Fruits of Abdomen? Are they referring to the internal organs of humans as sweet, delectable table fare? Perhaps they mean to reference the creation of a certain thing in the abdomen? Like, say, feces maybe? Well, in any case, it’s a terrible song title befitting a lackluster record. Humangled are ostensibly playing an old school, raw take on death metal, but I much prefer Cardiac Arrest for something like that, and I wasn’t even too keen on them!

The vocals are atrocious. They are delivered in two main registers – a higher pitched sort of death metal growl and a lower, breathier growl. The higher pitched portions might be almost bearable if there weren’t so damn many of them. Dude, shut up for a minute so I can hear the damn music! The lower pitched vocals are simply comical.

The rhythmic structure of tracks two (From Empty Sockets), three (Infinitesimal), and four (Brutalize the Pedophile) is completely whacky. It doesn’t seem to be a polyrhythm, as the drums and guitars never rotate into synchronization at any point. It actually makes the listener wonder if the tracks were not mixed properly. Whatever it is, it’s distracting and doesn’t produce any worthwhile musical effect. From Empty Sockets also has some strange thudding noises at about the 2:30 which sound like a glitch in the recording process.

There are are short clean vocal passages in tracks five (Liquidfire) and seven (Under the Roots) which end up just sounding really out place. Under the Roots, is the only thing even close to a decent song on this album, where things settle down long enough for the band to finally get some kind of groove going. At the end of the day, though, there simply is not much of interest on Fractal, let alone anything impressive or compelling.

Killing Songs :
None
Steve quoted 59 / 100
0 readers voted
Average:
 0
You did not vote yet.
Vote now

There are 3 replies to this review. Last one on Mon Aug 30, 2010 9:22 pm
View and Post comments