Sound Byte: Corpse Garden - Entheogen

Hailing Costa Rica, Corpse Garden is ready to unleash their second full length album on an unsuspecting worldwide populace. I must admit, prior to learning of this release, I had never heard of them. I am somewhat glad that changed. While, I do not think they will ever become a favorite of mine, there is no denying they have some definite skills to allow them to compete on a global scale. Not to mention, their band name is pretty cool. If you try to search it on Wikipedia, you will be directed to the body farm page, where you can learn about facilities that study human decomposition.



As for the music? It strikes me as a cross between brutal death metal and technical death metal. It strikes with the ferocity of the brutal variation, yet has the chops of the technical. The intention seems to wrangle fierce brutality with technical skills. This is far from a masturbatory showcase if technical runs, it is much more interested in creating songs with heavy, note laden riffs that infect the brain.

This blending is evidenced by the first two full songs of Entheogen. It opens with the straight forward brutality of "The Quantum Rapture" before delivering the more tech/riff oriented "Portal to the Oneiric." Everything hits a stride with "Suspended Over the Abyss."

I must say, these guys are pretty good, although they run into an issue I see a lot in death metal, the songs begin to blend together a little bit. While each song stands up as a solid slab to get into, they suffer from a lack of overall variety.

The best bits are the strong riffs, but beyond that is the bass work from Carlos Venegas. It is my understanding that he plays fretless, which I have to believe is not an easy thing to do. The bass element on this album is pretty amazing and really helps make the whole stand out from the crowd. Another thing that really caught my ear was that some of the bass reminded me of the Italian film scores of Goblin and Fabio Frizzi, not direct copies mind you, but there could be some of the influence mixed in.

Corpse Garden's Entheogen is certainly worth a spin if you are a fan of heavy music.



Recommended.