SEPTICFLESH — Communion (review)

Album · 2008 · Death Metal

3.5/5 · 2011-03-12
Xaxaar

Septic Flesh's Communion

This album's rating on this site is way too low and hope to show why in this review. The whole album creates a wonderful, symphonic, atmospheric mood throughout with each song (even though some are noticeably better than others).

Lovecraft's Death - starts off the album. This song has a lot of elements that make it unique. As the guitar work isn't the most unique, it adds a heaviness to it that, combined with the symphonic elements, creates a very good song.

Anubis - my personal favorite off the album. It starts off with a very calm riff, and then the drums come in and the song starts to kick off. But the punch really comes in at about 1:11. Another highlight of the song are the lyrics - the beckoning of the dying man to Anubis to save his soul (showed with growling vocals and clean vocals) is truly great.

Communion - at first listen to may sound like the Meow Mix jingle, but it actually quite a good song. It's a bit more basic than the other songs, but it still definitely has its moments. Once again, the lyrics are what makes this song more enjoyable for me. I like how this band can capture you in a story through the use of well thought-out diction along with the instruments (of course). Solid song over all.

Babel's Gate - very interesting song indeed. It starts off very quickly, but only about 13 seconds in it starts this very odd combination of almost a duet between the drums and the orchestra - very good though. The rest of the song just seems to be pure Septic Flesh in the sense of using blast beats and heavy guitar along with a symphony to create a well-written piece of music.

We, The Gods - sadly, the worst song on the album. It's not that it's bad, I just feel it doesn't brings anything quite relevant to the album - I would call it filler, but it's too good for that. It's not a bad song by any stretch of the imagination, just lacking where all of the other songs have succeeded so greatly on this album.

Sunlight Moonlight - a truly great song. It changes the mood up a bit and brings back the clean vocals (which we haven't hears since Anubis) and uses them to great effect. One of the better songs on the album considering the guitar work and the drumming, but not too much orchestral work - which is okay! The song makes up for it and then some.

Persepolis - this song using the orchestra to great effect. They use a lot of low winds on this song along with some low brass. This song is heavy and haunting at the same time. It creates this mood that almost makes you feel empowered. And, once again, the good lyrics also make a come back. The tale that this song is based off is an interesting one and they adapt it well into musical form.

Sangreal - probably the best written song on the album. It starts off with a very ambient intro and then the riff comes in. Personally, I'm a big fan of this riff - I love how it switches from the main beat to the and-beat. This song also has very good vocals, as the clean vocals and growling vocals mix very well. The song also has quite a nice mood change at about 3:13. It hits you with a very solid, heavy riff and abandons the orchestra for a while, but then returns with that riff I adore so much to play the song out.

Narcissus - the last song on the album. Goes back to the sort of mood that Sunlight Moonlight had, but is still very unique. It's a good song to send the album off of, even though it may not be the best. It has a similar theme to the song writing, but still feels unique in its own right. Has a neat guitar solo in it, for whatever that's worth to you. Overall, not the best song on the album, but not the worst - a good closer is all the song is.

Hope this review helped anyone who was considering getting the album to actually get it. This is my first review on this site, so hopefully it's not dreadful (also not bothering to spell check so excuse the grammar - I need to get some sleep).