Hypocrisy
Hypocrisy Destroys Wacken

THE REVIEW

The Wacken festival, held since 1990 in the small German town just a few dozen kilometers from Hamburg, is one of the most renowned and important Heavy Metal music gatherings; every year tens of thousands of people from all over the globe attend the famous event that lasts for three days. About seventy bands are hired for each edition, alternating on the four stages with an almost perfect organization (unlike Italian festivals!!).

The Swedish band Hypocrisy played there in 1998, specifically on the night of the eighth of August. The four horsemen of the apocalypse, led by Peter Tagtgren, don't have much time available; just under an hour in which they manage, paraphrasing the title of their work, to destroy and annihilate the audience, overwhelmed and suffocated by their impetuous and aggressive Death Metal.

A very brief intro allows them to ascend the stage; immediately afterward, the sluggish notes of "Roswell-47" start. A bastard, distressing mid-tempo; supported by Peter's deeply torn growl and the imposing combined work of bass and drums; impeccable recording level and sound quality. I imagine a disturbing volume from being so high: it couldn't have started better than this!!

The much more dynamic and fast "Inseminated Adoption" catapults us into typically Death Metal territories: with a final acceleration that is pure delirium and suffering, especially for the audience below the stage. Without any respite, without the slightest pause: the whole record is a continuous succession of more cadenced and powerful tracks, followed by songs devastating in their executive fury.

It's the turn of the long and restrained "Apocalypse," a track that opened their undisputed masterpiece "The Fourth Dimension": a demonstration of power, of inhuman strength with its slow, enveloping, sickening progression. Another bone-crushing piece in the true sense of the word that annihilates everything in its suffocating, imperious advance.

The sensational pairing almost at the end of "Pleasure Of Molestation" and "Killing Art": total pandemonium. Raw, dirty, incisive Death Metal. An orgy in music of ruthless violence played at a speed close to total derailment. Easy to imagine, at this point of the concert, the chaos among the audience eager for such primordial chaos.

We finally reach the end with "The Final Chapter": and here it slows down, entering once again into Death-Doom territories of enchanting and unhealthy beauty.

I hear them, I see them exit one by one, triumphantly leaving the stage: an amazing record for an amazing band...LEFT TO ROT...

But it's not over because the album concludes with four new songs recorded in the studio: it must at least be mentioned the Death'n'Roll stab of "Time Warp" where Hypocrisy once again demonstrate to be one of the most representative groups of the entire Scandinavian extreme scene...DEADLY...!!!