chris roberts

I was 18 when this little beauty was released. It is a moment in time. That scummy sounding guitar, rumbling undertone of bass, pulverising drums keeping it all in check, then the absolute filth of the vocals crawling all over the top. Perfection. The rest of the big guns of death metal all had their own qualities, with lesser known bands, or bands that came later, who sounded like them, but I don't recall any who sounded like obituary did. Or who did it like obituary did. They didn't do the over the top stuff, like the misogynistic lyrics of cannibal corpse, the god is a bastard stuff of deicide, the satanic lyrics and overtly technical structure of morbid angel. They just did Obituary. I don't know if cause of death or the end complete is my favourite album, but I prefer the sound on this. Everything is clear, no matter how filthy (apart from the lyrics, as can be the case with death metal, though some are much more audible on this than their previous albums) it just sounds BIG, like standing in front of the drum kit and cabs while the vocals swirl around your head like some disgusting surround sound of John tardy spewing his bile to the tunes. 9 songs of top quality death metal. From I'm in pain and back to one, ripping through to the title track and rotting ways. Not a bad song on it, but 'corrosive' is up there with my favourites. A beautiful ugly slab of shit from the 90s.

Choc full of energy, aggression and discordant melody. The quality just keeps coming.