Article by Lance Viggiano
Liers In Wait cast chains of non-random riffs in the legato style of metal pioneered by Morbid Angel to no effective artistic purpose. Spiritually Uncontrolled Art comprised of rationally woven re-contextualization of familiar death metal patterns which never manage to take on a distinct character as individual tracks. The album as a whole doesn’t begin to approach a definable emotive personality because the subject of this work is the personality of the composer: a master of phrasing with an encyclopedic knowledge of metal so adept in his craft that self-editing would diminish the efficacy of his work. These streams of coherent yet cold consciousness are hewn to Necrolord’s own sense of bravado; made concrete by a vocal delivery that proffers dominance rather than dread.
This is neither music for music’s sake nor music for the sake of expressing a transcendental idea. It is entirely about the composer’s ability to write coherent music out of the first thing that comes to mind – a mind that is very much a wellspring. In some ways this album is analogous to Eighties shred which existed as a pure demonstration of superiority over its contemporaries by parasitizing familiar content that was then latticed to the listener through overly sentimental melodic hooks. Antithetically, Necrolord eschews hooks entirely as they would constitute breaks and disruptions in the stream by deploying recognizable moments and thereby give the impression of emphasizing the better material, and consequently highlighting the lesser ideas of which there are none to be found. Conceptually this seizes the middle ground between tuneless noise and the summa cum laude of ten-mile-long cock rock.
Lasting impressions, significance and meaning is for the sensitive feminine types, not the fucking overlord. In this sense, Liers in Wait is a resounding success. Those lamenting the fact that this music does not “Do something” gravely miss its point.
Tags: 1992, cock rock, death metal, grotesque, Liers in Wait, morbid angel, necrolord, review, Sweden, Technical Death Metal
This has completely eluded me for years, but it’s pretty awesome. When compared to the previous reviewed album by Ripper, despite its lovely production the one heard hear just fucking destroys. I want a copy.
Necrolord is your fucking overlord.
I’ll send you mine. I don’t want it.
Ok, are you serious, tuff guy?
Can Brett Stevens write the articles from now on? The new guys recommendations are dubious and the Transilvanian Hunger article was trash. I paid good money for this crap because of the name, album title, and band member associations only to be let down by its poor quality. Sure enough, they would all start playing “nu-metal” a half decade later. Just stick to Altars of Madness.
Except David Rosales, he’s a good writer. One suggested Creepmime is crappy Carcass worship and that’s just a misinformed view (I don’t even like that band). I’m just saying its probably a better idea to let the people who actually listen to metal and understand its contents be the writers. This article just amounts to “sick riffs, brutal man” nonsense which, considering this is another in a long line of semi-coherent Morbid Angel worship with “abstract themes”, can be said about many bands then and now. This is more Metal-Archives than Dark Legions Archive.
Listenings to Symphonies…, Necroticism, and Shadows back to back and is a test of pattern recognition to check for idiocy that you’ve clearly failed.
Any similarities to Carcass are purely aesthetic, and even then it’s a stretch. It’s like comparing Demilich to Entombed because they’re both bottom heavy and use single-note picking. Creepmime sound more like Paradise Lost’s first album more than anything. You could also draw comparisons to 80s prog metal like Fates Warning.
Right, and confusing Drain STH playing Sonic & Knuckles egyptian level theme music as death metal was a resounding success? Talking about your Ares Kingdom praise, you lemming.
Had I employed the same level analysis used on Darkthrone to trash something the DLA milieu despises, you’d all buy me beer and frozen pizza. Are you so fickle that you derive your whole sense of taste from this website? It would explain why you had such a poor reaction to their publishing of my views to the contrary.
I thought it was a great article and I like TH. This place feels like an echo chamber sometimes, so it’s nice to get different perspectives that disrupt the status quo.
What fans forget is that their hero’s often hated each others music. Ledney thought most the Norwegians sounded like ass. Euronymous thought deicide were trendy posers. Given the deconstructive nature of metal, it shouldn’t be any surprise that its greatest renovations came out of oppositional attitudes. This is why it is always amusing to me to see the reactions towards contrarian opinions.
I love Slaughter of the Soul too.
David R. is not a good writer. He needs a dedicated editor.
As noted in the review, this album is not of poor musical quality at all. It entirely lacks an artistic vision and goes nowhere essential for reasons I explained. I addressed your reservations towards the TH review to the wrong user, regrettably. Nevertheless, I’d be disturbed if you took the review as high praise.
Transilvanian Hunger was not the creative nadir of Darkthrone. Transilvanian Hunger was, circa 1994, the distillation and purification of the feral essence of black metal. Where Hvis Lyset Tar Oss was Zarathustra delivering his judgment and leaving the town, Transilvanian Hunger is the wild howl rising from the woods in the moonlit night.
I hadn’t listened to this EP since the mid-90s. Serious fun. Thanks for the post.
Indeed a great album, a classic.
Sorry, but the review completely missed the mark for me. Far-fetched claims aplenty with very weak supporting arguments.
HERE IS A SEASONED METAL VETERAN SPEAKING THE TRUTH ABOUT
THE CURRENT STATE OF HEAVY METAL !!
http://www.hellridemusic.com/forum/printthread.php?t=14205
Hopefully the readership will implode, fucking parrots.
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That is by far one of if not the worst of all album covers I’ve ever seen, approaching the level of later Cryptopsy albums.
Necrolord’s own painting for the reissue was much better: