Six Reasons To Kill/Absidia - Morphology of Fear
Bastardized Recordings - 2004
By Adam McAuley
Six Reasons To Kill begin this split album in strong fashion with their grimy, gurgly take on death metal, not too far removed from early Obituary, Entombed and the like. Bolstered by bass-heavy production, they groove their way through a solid four songs of quality death metal. In fact, I rather prefer this to a lot of the generic metal that is churned out these days. The vocalist maintains a deep gurgly tone for a good portion of the first side, but sometimes ascends to higher intervals reminiscent of Sven from Aborted.
So, the bar is set, can the second outfit overtake the first? Well, no, but this may largely be attributed to the more than slightly substandard production. The swarming riffs completely bury the other elements of the music. But alas, the band is quite entertaining and performs their style perfunctorily. The info has Absidia down as metalcore, but I'd be almost as inclined to throw them in the melo-death genre, with distinct similarities to Dark Tranquillity. A creepy piano intro is a strong point of their half of the disc, as are the melodic breakdowns within their songs. An undeniably enjoyable romp, but they didn't really grab me as much as Six Reasons to Kill, maybe partially due to the lessened impact of mediocre production.
In short, the bands complement each other nicely, and the brevity of the split allows it give you blisters before you can catch your breath.
7.5/10 Overall
8/10 for Six Reasons to Kill
7/10 for Absidia
Official Bastardized Recordings website
Official Six Reasons To Kill website
Official Absidia website (currently under construction)
Bastardized Recordings - 2004
By Adam McAuley
Six Reasons To Kill begin this split album in strong fashion with their grimy, gurgly take on death metal, not too far removed from early Obituary, Entombed and the like. Bolstered by bass-heavy production, they groove their way through a solid four songs of quality death metal. In fact, I rather prefer this to a lot of the generic metal that is churned out these days. The vocalist maintains a deep gurgly tone for a good portion of the first side, but sometimes ascends to higher intervals reminiscent of Sven from Aborted.
So, the bar is set, can the second outfit overtake the first? Well, no, but this may largely be attributed to the more than slightly substandard production. The swarming riffs completely bury the other elements of the music. But alas, the band is quite entertaining and performs their style perfunctorily. The info has Absidia down as metalcore, but I'd be almost as inclined to throw them in the melo-death genre, with distinct similarities to Dark Tranquillity. A creepy piano intro is a strong point of their half of the disc, as are the melodic breakdowns within their songs. An undeniably enjoyable romp, but they didn't really grab me as much as Six Reasons to Kill, maybe partially due to the lessened impact of mediocre production.
In short, the bands complement each other nicely, and the brevity of the split allows it give you blisters before you can catch your breath.
7.5/10 Overall
8/10 for Six Reasons to Kill
7/10 for Absidia
Official Bastardized Recordings website
Official Six Reasons To Kill website
Official Absidia website (currently under construction)
