UMUR
"Blind Existence" is the debut full-length studio album by Polish death metal act Sceptic. The album was released through Mystic Productions in 1999. Sceptic formed in 1995 and released three demos before being signed for the release of "Blind Existence".
The music on the album is technical death metal greatly influenced by early- to mid-nineties Death (the band). Especially the guitar riffs are sometimes very similar to the riffing style of Death but the technical drumming is also in the vein of the most technical drumming on the last couple of Death albums. Sceptic isn´t what I would call a clone though. They also display original ideas. The instrumental track "Outworld" and the progressive (with clean singing) "Painful Silence" are the two tracks that set themselves apart from the remaining tracks on the album, but those two tracks also provide inconsistency and some stylistic confusion. Especially the latter, which sounds a bit out of place on the album. When discussing consistency the quality of the tracks also vary a bit too much on "Blind Existence" and especially near the end of the album I´m beginning to wonder if it´s the same band who recorded the first couple of brilliant technical death metal tracks as the one who recorded the last couple of mediocre death metal songs. It´s a shame because when Sceptic are best they are actually really great.
The production leaves a bit to be desired too. The bass sounds a bit thin and metallic (especially the slap-bass parts sound very thin) and the snare drum sound is rather horrible. It sounds like someone is beating the crap out of a dry piece of wood. So upon conclusion "Blind Existence" is to some extent a decent quality debtu album from Sceptic, but it´s simply too inconsistent in quality to deserve more than a 3 star rating.