Friday 17 May 2013

PAGANIZER - World Lobotomy (Album Review)

By:Chris Markwell

Album Type: Full Length
Date Released: 10/5/2013
Label: Cyclone Empire
 

 
 
 
"World Lobotomy" track listing:
 
1. Prelude To The Lobotomy
2. World Lobotomy
3. The Sky On Fire
4. Mass Of Parasites
5. As Blood Grows Cold
6. Ödeläggaren
7. You Call It Deviance
8. As The Maggots Gather
9. Trail Of Human Decay
10. The Drowners
11. The Last Chapter
12. Hunt Eat Repeat
 
 
The Review:
 
Nothing about PAGANIZER is subtle.  Even their name, all capitalised, is a bold statement of loud intent, and their latest album ‘World Lobotomy’ is 12 tracks of punishing death metal riffs and screaming, scorching solos.  If you like your metal to sound like a living mosh pit, then PAGANI
ZER
are the guys for you. 
 
Their intro song ‘Prelude to the Lobotomy’ starts with an ominous piano piece, which descends into discord and then you hear it.  The sound of drilling.  With headphones on, it’s as though your entire skull is being broken into by some mad doctor.  As soon as you’re pared open sufficiently by the unknown driller, the title track blasts into you with the force of surgery without anaesthesia.  The guitars shred and tear at you like they were bone saws going for your exposed flesh, and Rogga Johansson’s voice simply delivers blunt force trauma to your ears.  Nowhere is safe from PAGANIZER’s death metal attack: it’s just that brutal. 
 
Dennis Blomberg’s chugging bassline begins ‘The Sky on Fire’, a menacing backbeat to the relentless guitar assault that hammers in with a jackhammer’s ruthlessness.  Just as soon as the last growls die down, ‘Mass Of Parasites’ steps up and delivers another dose of crushing, howling metal that makes you set your jaw in a show of angry defiance.  This is death metal of the finest vintage: drink deep and listen well. 
 
As Blood Grows Cold’ builds on what has preceded it and snarls at you like an enraged beast from the Jurassic Period.  Ödeläggaren’ (which I’ve found out is Swedish for ‘Desolater’) follows the carnage, and is a minute-long blast of grind core, a suitable nod to Napalm Death and Nasum with a twist of PAGANIZER’s own brand of aggression.  ‘You Call It Deviance’ is strewn with pinch-harmonics and Jocke Ringdahl’s masterful and punishing drumbeats: it’s a heavyweight track that threatens to choke you out with its sonic savagery. 
 
If you feel the need to take a breather or relax, there’s no opportunity for you to do so as ‘As the Maggots Gather’ slams into you with demonic intent to damage your eardrums.  It wrenches and batters you furiously, then the next track ‘Trail Of Human Decay’ rushes in with a lead pipe to pummel you some more.  There is seriously no let up of the pace or intensity on this album, so prepare accordingly. 
 
The final three tracks of the album – ‘The Drowners’, ‘The Last Chapter’ and ‘Hunt Eat Repeat’ – are storming, surging offerings of death metal, filled to the brim with bloodthirsty riffage and boiling, angry lyrics.  Each one elevates the anger scale to near maniacal levels, until ‘Hunt Eat Repeats’ closes ‘World Lobotomy’s proceedings with a suitably brazen, brash rush of drum blasts and guitar shrieks.  The Swedish quartet’s ninth album is an old-school death metal blast that would look great in any metalhead’s collection.  Put it on, strap yourself in and let the surgery commence.
 
 
Band info: Facebook || YouTube