While this may be their 8th album, this is my first encounter with the American quartet. Might have something to do with the fact that I’ve never really delved much into deathcore, but here we go now, and while there may be times, after repeated album listens, that things may feel a little monotonous, there’s also always something new that stands out that I didn’t notice before. Formed 16 years ago and being with Nuclear Blast for the better part of a decade, this shall be their fourth release for the label. It would also appear they recently lost their lead guitarist but have decided not to replace him and with guitarist Cory Arford looking after all guitar duties henceforth. Vocalist Scott Ian Lewis can switch from low guttural barks to lengthy growls and harsh screeches with no apparent effort and is complemented by Fred Calderon’s bottom end as the bass rumbles on at high pass following Shawn Cameron’s drums.
They open the album with the title track, “Graveside Confessions”, and waste absolutely no time getting things up to pace with rapid blasting and chunky guitar riffs, but they don’t keep the manic pace going for the entire song, rather opting to break things down and add some keyboards for ambience and an excellent eerie effect as the vocals feel a touch raw.
The guitars on “Pray For Peace” have a mid-paced groove to them and are full of squealing bends while the frenetic footwork on the drums is rapid and littered with triplets over the drawn-out roars.
The stop/start syncopation of “Seven Souls” just adds to the feeling of speed when the verse comes about, while “Cursed” feels so much slower, even though the drums are probably faster, owing to the fact the guitar riff sounds like it’s being played backwards and with the tuning changing continuously. Perfect for skin crawling shivers.
“Carry Us Away” wouldn’t feel out of place on a symphonic black metal album as the tremoloed guitar matches the pace of the drumming, along with the atmospheric keyboards painting a supporting accompaniment.
“Talk To The Dead” on the other hand is straight up death metal spat at you at breakneck speed with the drumming easing up slightly midway through only for the crushing guitars to come in even heavier, before everything blasts off one more as if pulsing in a blender.
Slowing things down completely and with a near acoustic feel to it, “January Nights” has lightly brushed drums as the guitars slow build the speed of their strumming before the lead kicks in as the bass takes on all the bottom end rumble.
A quick drum roll, then the guitars and vocals rip into “Cemetery Wander”, then the song takes a turn and slows down to becoming chunky riffs over choppy drum fills with harsh rasping vocals.
While the drumming on “Countess Of Perpetual Torment” is constantly fast paced, the guitars alternate between extremely fast and slow but heavy, whereas the bass cuts through both and fills out the sound completely.
As I’m not really a KoЯn aficionado, if I hadn’t read that “Dead Bodies Everywhere” was a cover, I would have been none the wiser, as they make it all their own, but I guess the KoЯn bass groove is a giveaway once you know.
The piano on “Cold Dead Summer”, along with the general manic delivery give it a blackened death vibe that incorporates both styles well and makes for a good song.
“Alive For The Last Time” has rolling guitar triplets that are accompanied by rapid fire blasting on the drums to give a rather guerrilla ferocity to the faster elements, but the piano manages to take away the harshness as it plays the song out.
The last 3 tracks on the album are re-recordings of songs from their earliest releases and somehow, they do not sound like they weren’t written to fit in at all. Granted they may have been written a while ago, but they are still delivered with as much aggression and passion as everything else thus far and “Collaborating Like Killers” has some catchy hooks, while “My Heart In Atrophy” is blisteringly fast and still has some of the slowest passages on the album. Final track “Slit Wrist Savior” is a great epilogue to the album and manages to incorporate so many elements of what appear to be staples of their song writing.
(8/10 Marco Gaminara)
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