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Rating: From the meeting of two stars of American Death Metal, Chris Barnes, renowned vocalist of Cannibal Corpse, and Allen West, lead guitar of Obituary, Six Feet Under was born. Barnes, dissatisfied with the music played in his original group, probably too fast for his nature, after participating in the demo tape "Created To Kill" (a prelude to the album "Vile"), leaves the band that had given him notoriety and joins forces with Allen West. Terry Butler, fresh from disappointment with Massacre, is enlisted as bassist, and Greg Gall, former Last Rites, as drummer.
The quartet thus set up burst onto the scene in 1995 with this album "Haunted" trying to crush the competition in the Death Metal scene, but instead of focusing on speed, our deathsters turn to impact, obsessive phrasing, the sinister, crepuscular charm of the compositions, thus in this platter, we find old friends from horror movies: werewolves, boogeymen, parasitic organisms, and zombies, in a rustic ensemble made lugubrious by the cerulean cover with a screaming skull from the depths of the earth, while inside the booklet the tracklist is engraved on a tombstone and gate spikes directly from the movie "An American Werewolf in London." Lyrically, Barnes does not disappoint, delving into his splatter saga akin to "Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer" mixed with "Candyman" over an emaciated soundscape, made appealing by the sound of Obituary, indeed, as Allen West reintroduces the riffing work of his old companions, stripping it of solos, apparent in just three episodes, but with a dark production emphasized by the bass that helps the guitar deliver a tomb-like sound in the mist. Drummer Greg Gall doesn’t perform drum acrobatics, it’s evident he doesn’t love speed, but he’s calm, indolent, knowing the sound mix doesn’t move in that direction; good old Allen, author of all the music, sometimes urges him to accelerate, to speed up the rhythm.
"Monster music" is the term coined by my father to define the melody that came from the speakers of my eardrum-breaking device, a symphony to be played in the car immersed in fog, almost to evoke the lepers from “Fog” armed with metallic hooks: thus "Haunted" presents itself as a two-headed dragon, with the first five songs of high quality where the band fires all its shots, while the other six pieces struggle to find their own identity, remaining there, played to reach the end, devoid of appeal with only the vocalist supporting the metal cloud. It starts with "The Enemy Inside" featuring a tectonic (not speed) rhythm, characterized by Barnes' well-calibrated voice, halfway between a hound's growl and a bear's roar: after a full moon night intro, the roll and Obituary sonic wall come in, with West owning the scene despite Trevor Peres, and with Gall skillfully operating the pedals providing the right rhythmic mat. "Silent Violence" proceeds at a trot but doesn’t alter the little project, with Barnes superb when he shouts the song title, like a commuter missing the bus. But here the werewolf bursts in on the third track: stuttering strumming is followed by caterpillar bass, doubled guitar, and off they go! The curtain raises with the bloodthirsty wolf, but let’s see it up close: "The blood of wolf infects my body, in the night hear the howling, screaming flesh chewed to the bone, bleeding, eternal horror...", the track fades as it started, providing a sense of anguish with the six-string sound seemingly getting lost in the night.
"Still Alive" attacks instead with a seductive solo by Allen West, proceeding with the screams and vocal doubles of Chris who, bless him, captures the attention of the audience without ever boring them. "Beneath A Black Sky" will become a post-album concert classic, with a war-drum intro and the exploding riff preceding Barnes's scream "Look to the skyyy..."; in this record, the ex-Cannibal Corpse frontman does not intersperse his growl with the witch-like hysterical voice as in the old Cannibal song "Fucked With A Knife". For those who know the major Death groups, these Six Feet Under would deserve a thrashing, maybe because they don’t distill pieces with speed flavor, perhaps because they produce a rhythm from three steps on a brick, or maybe because they reintroduce the same rhythmic recipes molded by Obituary. But here’s the point. Overcoming the initial impact, the pieces gradually breach our carcass, making us moderately shake the cabeza with their horror-tinged aura, but let’s not forget the second part of the album rich in spleen: excessive similarity among the pieces, no frills, no Reinert on the horizon, no Murphy to ennoble the pieces, not even a DiGiorgio in "Fiend For Blood" format (Autopsy lessons). Take it or leave it.
An unusual work, to listen to with satisfaction, difficult to assimilate, yet also impossible to forget with certain vintage passages that nourish our thoughts à la Kafka: "Beneath A Black Sky"
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
01 The Enemy Inside (04:19)
It gained control of me
the dark side of my mind
this hollow shell
A body with no soul
Feeding on me, growing inside, this parasite
dormant within, now it's alive, it came to life
Feeding on me, growing inside, this parasite
dormant within, now it's alive, it came to life
With each breath I take
I feel the pain
It has a hold of me
the thoughts I think
deep within my body
eating me from inside
I can't control
this other self
The enemy, the enemy, the enemy inside of me
Feeding on me, growing inside, this parasite
dormant within, now it's alive, it came to life
Feeding on me, growing inside, this parasite
dormant within, now it's alive, it came to life
Separate from myself
Actions without thoughts
in constant agony
distortion of reality
Alternate emotions
now come to life
my soul asleep
unconscious, but awake
The enemy, the enemy, the enemy inside of me
Feeding on me, growing inside, this parasite
dormant within, now it's alive, it came to life
Feeding on me, growing inside, this parasite
dormant within, now it's alive, it came to life
It gained control of me
the dark side of my mind
this hollow shell
A body with no soul
With each breath I take
I feel the pain
It has a hold of me
the enemy inside
02 Silent Violence (03:35)
I cut your throat, wide, opening
A hole in your neck
Your blood sprays my skin warm and wet
you can't feel your heart beating
scream no one is listening
I cut your tongue from your mouth
dying you feel yourself slip away
your dead body will be left, unburied
on one will find you dead
All is quiet as I force my fist down your cut throat
Grabing tendons and veins
I pull your insides out through your lipless mouth
Your stiff body is cold and still
dying you feel yourself slip away
your dead body will be left, unburied
on one will find you dead
Violent
Silence
dying you feel yourself slip away
your dead body will be left, unburied
on one will find you dead
Haphazardly I remove your spleen
And your liver
There is much blood
Eyes have been removed
While you were still alive
Now I tear your flesh, I am ripping your skin
dying you feel yourself slip away
your dead body will be left, unburied
on one will find you dead
Fingerless hands, clenched - I continue to dissect
blood spurting from punctured flesh
your naked body stripped of skin
soon you will rotten
Insects infest your flesh
04 Still Alive (04:06)
dead, but now I wake
Rotten - eight years in the grave
smell the ripe decay
No eyes in my skull, but I still see
Alive, I'm dead, alive - something has given me life
Cut me I bleed no blood
stab my skin, out runs the pus
try to kill what's already dead
A dead corpse living rotten
Resting dead - now I rise
from the grave, my flesh is decayed
Alive, I'm dead, alive
You tried to kill me
I don't die that easily
back from the dead
I live again
Alive, I'm dead, alive - something has given me life
drinking the blood from a severed head
living flesh soon will rotten
horrors of the undead
A headless corpse, dead - convulsing
bleeding, no blood left
No way to kill what is dead
Alive, I'm dead, alive
07 Remains of You (03:24)
You saw your life pass before your eyes
I watched your body twist in pain rotten bodies, dead
Leaking pushing limbs separated heads
Smell the rotten dead degenerating flesh
Mutilated after death molded decayed skin
Decomposition bodily disintegration
I took an axe to your head chopping rotted flesh
Brain is seeping from the cracks in your skull
Blood drains from holes in your torso
I took your life from you
Collapsed organs now rot and corrode
Your empty body - bloated pus clots on discolored skin
Lifeless abused remains remains of you
Nothing remains of you
Once alive now just a pile of flesh
Decomposition bodily disintegration
I took an axe to your head chopping rotted flesh
Brain is seeping from the cracks in your skull
Blood drains from holes in your torso
I took your life from you
I violate the rotten dead bodies tortured, stiffened carnage
In my mind i need to kill amputate, cutting skin, through the bone
Disfigured human flesh leaking pussing limbs
Separated heads smell, the rotted dead
I took an axe to your head chopping rotted flesh
Brain is seeping from the cracks in your skull
Blood drains from holes in your torso... i took your life from you
I defile the rotten corpse mutilated after death
Molded decayed skin your empty body- bloated
Pus clots on discolored skin lifeless abused remains
Remains of you nothing remains of you
08 Suffering in Ecstasy (02:46)
Suffer inside myself
There is no hope
In this grave
Bottomless
The deepest depths
An empty pit
No way to live
Dead
It's killing me
This deadly plague
Poisoned blood
Runs through my veins
Finding pleasure
Within the pain
I'm suffering
A step away
From the edge
One more rush
All I need is
A harder push
There is no cure
My infection is self inflicted
I'm suffering
In ecstasy
Slowly dying
Inside my body
Locked away
With no escape
Finding pleasure
Within the pain
A step away
From the adge
All I need is
A harder push
There is no cure
My infection is self inflicted
It's killing me
This deadly plague
Poisoned blood
Runs through my veins
Finding pleasure
Within the pain
I'm suffering
Suffer inside myself
There is no hope
In this grave
Bottomless
The deepest depths
An empty pit
No way to live
Dead
A step away
From the edge
One more rush
All I need is
A harder push
There is no cure
My infection is self inflicted
I'm suffering
In ecstasy
Slowly dying
Inside my body
Locked away
With no escape
Finding pleasure
Within the pain
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