Napalm Death
Utopia Banished

THE REVIEW

Unlike many of their illustrious peers, Napalm Death have always managed to give a concrete, tangible, and politically incorrect meaning to the sonic and visual violence that has always accompanied them. All this at the cost of being downgraded - by certain snobbish critics who couldn’t be more snobbish - to an "hardcore group," or simply "extremist punk."

Never was such simplification more wrong: it's true, they are not a death-metal band in the strict sense, as their music style is "simplified" compared to the "sonic stabbings," full of hyper-technicalities, of Morbid Angel and the like. But this cannot be a flaw; if anything, it is a very precise stylistic choice. Here, in fact, more than desolation, the sheer heaviness, the dark emotional charge, dissonant solos, and disturbing melodies, there is an almost rationalizing tendency, hitting the mark without unnecessary digressions. With the most sincere pessimism one can demonstrate, and with not insignificant technical skill. In essence, they bring back to death the disillusioned - and realistic - attitude of bands like the Dead Kennedies, to whom they explicitly refer.

This album, unlike the crazy "From Enslavement to Obliteration", is characterized by a sonic "cleanliness," a very carefully produced sound, and a not overly studied yet superb compositional phase. For them, the meaning of a lyric or the overall impact of the track is more important than sophistication and experimentation. Notable is "Idiosyncratic", particularly "I Abstain", which features one of Mark Greenway's best "vocular armageddons," accompanied by a massively heavy, raw, super-fast soundscape: perfect, in one word. Not to forget the ferocious "Christening Of The Blind", and less "immediate" tracks like "The World Keeps Turning" or "Judicial Slime" (in which the band's punk-rock origins are evident).

Here it is demonstrated that possessing good technical skills does not necessarily mean diving into the wonders of jazz-metal or the cynicism of guitar-heroes, but a "serene" coexistence (allow me the term) of a rational and a chaotic aspect is possible. "Contemptuous", among other things, proves how they can also perfectly play slower tracks, I'd say almost doom, as further evidence of their skill and compositional ability.

They finally break away from the monotonicity - favored by some - of previous work, with broad demonstrations of mastery over their instruments, a preference for a "raw" sound mixed with always correctly measured tempo changes. The compositions always bear the ND trademark, that is, explosive, incredibly fast and brutal: the ultimate link between metal and punk. Two irreconcilable genres, according to blurred "academic" definitions (and many "purist" metalheads): a thesis promptly dismantled by albums like this.

Mark "Barney" Greenway - Vocular Armageddon
Jesse Pintado - Dissonant Distorted Delirium No. 1
Mitch Harris - Dissonant Distorted Delirium No. 2
Shane Embury - Sub-end Vexation
Danny Herrera - Hyper Cans