Sepultura
Arise

THE REVIEW

1991 was certainly the year of Death Metal.
In this period, in fact, the genre reached its climax, the compositional ability of the groups in the genre was extremely prolific, and the innovations that this music brought to the Metal scene definitively consecrated it among the main genres, alongside Classic and Thrash, from which Death directly derived.
During this time, therefore, most of the memorable masterpieces of the genre were released, including, mentioning the most famous and undoubtedly the best, "Human" by Death from the late Chuck Schuldiner (R.I.P), the excellent "Blessed Are The Sick" by Morbid Angel, "Cause Of Death" by Obituary, "Unquestionable Presence" by Atheist, the excellent third work by Pestilence "Testimony Of The Ancients" and finally this "Arise", from that group (today sadly decayed and known to most for their nu-metal melodies and, as rightly pointed out by our cliffburton86, "growl ala Harry Potter") that at the time was easily associated with the aforementioned names and considered equally valid (in fact, personally, nowadays real metal fans don't believe in Sepultura more than the Pope believes in Motorhead).

Very likely, this album boasts the best production ever executed on a metal work (it's no coincidence that the mastermind behind the masterpiece is a guy named Scott Burns, who has already worked with many groups, including many of those mentioned above). The CD was recorded in 1991 at the historic Morrisound Studios by the original Seps lineup after the change of the first guitarist, namely the great (the once great) Max Cavalera on vocals and rhythm guitar, who with an absolutely unmistakable growl speaks against the Church, Fascism, injustice, and against the World in general; the talented Andreas Kisser on lead guitar, who often intervenes with lightning solos that, however, often appear to me to be meaningless; Paulo Pinto Jr on bass, who doesn't know how to play and proudly boasts about it (it may be the brain fried by too much glue sniffing, it may be his technical-compositional inconsistency, but the man ignores the word "transition" and doesn’t deviate at all from the guitar lines, in full Slayer style) and the human octopus Igor Cavalera, who on this album offers an astonishing performance, thus confirming himself among the best Death Metal drummers.

The sound darkens, a dreamlike and hypnotic atmosphere takes control of the album, until a distant explosion starts the Hell: it's the beginning of "Arise", the title track, perhaps the best song on the album, with an excellent performance from the Cavalera brothers and a desperate Pinto who really can't figure out the three notes that compose the song's riff.
The other noteworthy songs are "Dead Embryonic Cells", which was hugely successful upon its release, "Desperate Cry", "Murder", "Under Siege" and "Infected Voice": despite this, it's difficult to find any performance drop in the other songs, and the less fortunate episodes ("Subtraction", "Altered State" and "Meaningless Movements") would be worthy of another medium-high level band. Furthermore, if you have the 1997 remastered edition, you can count on some bonus tracks, namely a Burns remix of "Desperate Cry" (where the bass, unfortunately, is audible causing us strong crises of conscience on why such a beautiful instrument should be played by such an incapable man), an excellent cover of a Motorhead classic, "Orgasmatron", truly exceptional, very original and well executed, and a piece called "Intro-C.I.U (Criminals In Uniform) that the friendly communists wanted to insert at the end of the CD but didn’t due to duration issues.
The common thread, as you've certainly understood, is socially committed protest themes, tons of anger, and last but not least, a desperate Pinto struggling with an instrument that, in his eyes, appears like a venomous snake (poor guy).

The masterpiece of the Seps, in short: an album that took the Death-Thrash of "Schizophrenia" and "Beneath The Remains" and brought it to its logical conclusion, this time relying on an excellent production that doesn’t undermine the quality of the work (as happened with other works).
An absolute piece of Death history, played as it should be (and here Pinto starts laughing) with the addition of excellent themes and excellent production. An album to be consigned to posterity, in short, one of the rare gems that Death will never forget and will look back on with immense, sad regret.