The Black Dahlia Murder, Detroit's resident melodic death metal band, have not let constant touring cut back on productivity. Only two years after releasing metal masterpiece, Nocturnal, and a non-stop touring schedule do we get their next offering: Deflorate. Another new album, and TBDM follow suit by getting another new band member (Miasma had new drummer Zach, Nocturnal had new bassist Bart and drummer Shannon, and now Deflorate has a new guitarist in Ryan Knight). The new album features 10 tracks, a running theme of their last 3 albums, that clock in at roughly 35 minutes. And while their albums have never been terribly long, and any fans of TBDM aren't expecting some 10 minute long death metal epic track, the whole experience of Deflorate seems very brief. Perhaps it's the fact that the songs all share a common tempo, but with the new high standards that Nocturnal created, most fans will likely be left feeling like there should be more.
The album artwork is, well, colorful for a death metal band. The whole insert is white, and features a futuristic alien city in the background and some large mother-like monster on her(?) throne turning some guys into
statues.
What this being has to do with the album concept I dunno. I'm not even sure how the title deflorate fits into it as that's not really a word. When I think Deflorate I'm thinking about the taking of virginity. So maybe that's it. Or instead of virginity it's really just taking innocence. Again, what taking innocence has to do with the fat thing with fetuses (feti?) around her neck turning men into stone as red-robed monks chant...I dunno. But who cares really, metal album art hardly ever makes sense. So let's not question it, let's just enjoy it. There's a rumor around that it was inspired by Iron Maidan's
PowerSlave album artwork, and if you look at the two together you get the feeling that the rumor is probably right. So, let's get to the music.
1.
Black Valor: A song that is both lyrically and musically in the vein of at least one or two tracks off of Unhallowed and Nocturnal, Black Valor is about a satanic army of darkness that, of course, wants to kill Christians and the Christian's god. Nothing new in the terms of groundbreaking lyrics, but I'm not complaining. This song more than just sets the tempo to the rest of the album, it pretty much lets you know that the guitar sound is going to be somewhat over mixed together and in turn seem muffled in the background, while Trevor's voice takes the indomitable lead for the rest of the album. The song is technical, and of course melodic. A good pick for the opening track as it is quite a rocker, but not likely to be anyone's favorite track off of the album.
2.
Necropolis: This song starts off with a blast, a few strums of the main riff, and then immediately goes into a frenzy of double picking and Trevor showcasing his well-honed vocals. One of my favorite parts is found in the first verse where he switches from his death metal grunt to his blackend screech mid sentence. And not to seem like I'm sucking his dick, but it's truly a testament to how talented he's become vocally. Lyrically the song seems to be about a man renouncing his faith because of a lack of evidence for his former God. Once again Trevor has written a very descriptive short story within his lyrics that really illustrates the a character (ie Elder Misanthropy, Deathmask Divine). Musically the song is catchy, but will surely create some of the largest pits in concert. And while the song doesn't include one of Ryan's best guitar solos, this is easily one of the best tracks on the album.
3.
A Selection Unnatural: No rest for the wicked, A Selection Unnatural wastes no time getting right into the first verse. Here the band decides to shift the dial from melodic to brutal. Guitars shred through a technical flurry of chords and even Trevor favors his death metal grunts over-top of the once lead shriek (the first of many songs on this album). The solo is perfect. The addition of Ryan is very noticeable even if the solo is short. He really "Sweedished" the lead guitar sound of this band. Something I'm sure the other band mates (and die-hard Carcass and At the Gates fans) were more than happy to have. But boy is this song ever short. Even if it is almost 3 minutes long, the song just flies by in a frenzy of heavy. Lyrically the song is about a new born with some genetic mutations that make it more of a monster than a human. Trevor admits to having been influenced by a program or two on TV about such real life events. Additionally he wrote "It's mysteries will baffle modern medicine for centuries to come", which will likely be chanted by everyone in the audience when A Selection Unnatural get's played to a sea of fist pumping.
4.
Denounced, Disgraced: Finally, a little bit of a tempo change. Well, not at first, but the song does breakdown temporarily two or three times through out as some key lyrics are chanted. The song's lyrics seem to be about a group of soldiers (think bronze age) having to kill their leader for betraying the kingdom. Once again Trevor does his mid-verse singing style change. This time a little more polished than on Necropolis. But what I want to talk about is the bass. Kudos to the producer for letting Bart's bass line shine! Sure there had been songs in the pass where the bass might have the chance to introduce the next riff, but in this song you can actually hear it playing with the guitars (where as most metal bands push the bass back so far in the mix you can barely tell if they're there). The solo is pretty good, nothing magical, but does feature some cool tapping. This song is a good example of how the guitars seem to be too meshed together and muffled. In my opinion it sounds like how they did on Miasma instead of how clean they were on Nocturnal. The song is good, but not really remember-able enough to be a real fan favorite.
5.
Christ Deformed: Christ Deformed begins with a slower, more melodic riff, and than quickly abandons it so it can start thrashing. Lyrically the song is about raping the children of the Lord in order to convert them to Satanism.
"Hymen breached with a cross
Children of your lord
Semen peppers their faces
We seek to distort
Our kingdom shall come"
Absolutely fantastic. The song becomes a little forget-able towards the end (around the same time the song enters the lack-luster solo and than revisits the intro-riff), but it will definitely be one that fans revisit (if not just for the rousing lyrics of sodomy in the name of blasphemy).
6.
Death Panorama: Another song that wastes no time getting into the verse, and certainly does not overstay it's welcome. This song is only a buck fifty in length, shorter if you cut out the ten seconds of feedback at the end. Melodic death metal in the guise of a grindcore song? Well, whatever you want to call it, the song is pretty good. It's fast, will only be remember-able because of it's lack of many parts, and features Shannon putting some authority into his double bass. Hell, they even made room for a solo in there. Lyrically the song seems to be about what it's like to have your life flash before your eyes when you die. Perhaps the brevity of the song is to further illustrate the "Not in chronology but so wildly all at once" lyrics that describe the Death Panorama. Or not
7.
Throne of Lunacy: Hooray for HP Lovecraft! Where would metal lyricist be without your short stories and
Cthulhu Mythos. This song reminds me of Morbid Angel. And it's not just the chants to the ancient ones or any of the other Lovecraft references. The favoring of the death metal grunts, a few of the chugging riffs, and even the solo to some extent (though it quickly goes back to melodic Swedish death metal). This is one of my favorite tracks on the album, though I'm not entirely sure why. Song writing is very similar to what we got on Nocturnal, and I don't think anyone's gonna complain about that, yet I think this track is likely to be one of the few on the album that will stand out.
8.
Eyes of Thousand: This song sounds like it should have been on Miasma. The lyrical content (don't trust this woman because she's a succubus that'll "suck you dry"), the unwavering blast beats (not always a good thing), and the guitar parts are all reminiscent of that era of TBDM. Not that it's a bad thing, even if that was my least favorite album by them, it's just nothing new. Except for the really heavy part around the :20 mark (yes, even that far in the song's identity is clear), but sadly we don't ever hear from that part again.
9.
That Which Erodes the Most Tender of Things: Another great track, and for one reason: discernible parts! Who doesn't love technical guitar parts or blitzkrieg riffs, but sometimes we also like to be able to tell the verse from the chorus from the refrain etc. Lyrically the song seems to be from a mothers point of view in which she had a still born child, but has spent some time treating it as a live baby because she's too sad to let it go. It's sort of the female version of Deathmask Divine. Musically I don't think anyone could complain about this song. It's everything you'd expect from TBDM.
10.
I Will Return: What did you expect? Of course it's an epic! Apex, Miasma, Warborn, and now I Will Return. It starts off with a somewhat whimsical (but not in a gay way) slower lead guitar riff, but unlike Warborn it quickly goes into a melodeath rocker like Apex (not nearly as much of an anthem as Miasma though). Lyrics are about a rich guy who can afford to be cryogenically preserved so that he can live forever. CRYONICS! Finally a song that somewhat fits the futuristic look of the album art. Yet has nothing to do with a fat feti (I'm sticking with it at this point) infused necklace donning queen thing, but we can't have everything.
The album was also packaged with a 40 minute DVD titled "We're Going Places", which is largely just about the bands time in Russia (where the Majesty DVD left off). I haven't watched it yet, but I'm sure if I liked Majesty I'll enjoy this. Overall I have to say that the album is not going to be raved over like Nocturnal. It has it's moments, but there just isn't enough there to really make it equal to Nocturnal let alone better than it. Even though the songs are roughly the same running length as they've always been, the album just seems to be over before it began. I blame this largely on the lack of decipherable guitar riffs between songs, and not much in the creativity department from Shannon and his drumming either. That's exactly what was wrong with Miasma, save for a few tracks most of them could be interchanged for any other. At least this time there aren't retarded song titles (I'm looking at you Dave Goes to Hollywood). I've found that I enjoy the album more when I don't listen to it by itself, but instead when I play it along with the rest of TBDM's back catalog. The tracks just don't seem to mesh well on the album, but when you put your mp3 player on random you'll have no problem going from Funeral Thirst to Necropolis and back to A Vulgar Picture.
When I heard that the guys were coming out with a new album I half expected a result like this. It's the same thing that happened on Miasma. Write a great album, tour heavily, and then release another album to remain relevant and keep the record company happy. Well this time they released the well received Nocturnal, toured heavily, and in my opinion pulled this one out of the oven a little too soon. Sure they got a new guitar player, and undoubtedly they'll have to get use to writing together, but as I mentioned before this isn't the first time they've replaced a band member. Possibly it could be different because he was the lead guitar player, but I'm inclined to think that more than one member of the band plays a part in writing a song. So I'm sticking by the fact that they were touring and didn't have the ability to put forth the correct amount of concentration necessary to write a truly great album. In my opinion I think the band should finish up their touring (which seems to be well into next year) and than take a short break. I know it's tough because they are a metal band and they're not exactly raking in the big bucks, but I think in order for their next album to really wow anyone it'll have to introduce some new ideas. Not that they should change their style at all, but maybe not parade their two main musical influences so much (Carcass and At The Gates). But even with the negative aspects of the album there is a lot of good on it. I greatly enjoy the skill Trevor has found in his singing, I like how Bart's bass is being mixed a little bit louder because it can definitely stand on it's own, Shannon's drumming is still tight as fuck, and Ryan's solos and guitar skill are exactly what the band needed to push them a little bit further in the songwriting realm (although it didn't really stand out on this album I'm sure it will next time around).
Album art I give an
8/10. It was cool, but it looked like a colorful version of what was featured on the Nocturnal album. Just replace the church with the fat thing and boom. Hell, it's even in the same perspective. I'm not sure exactly what it was about the album that inspired the artist to draw this cover, but it was very well done. And I highly doubt that anyone is going to give TBDM a hard time for having a white cover. It's still not as unsettling as Immortal's
Battles in the North.
Muscially I give the album a
6/10. It was good, and some songs were really technical, or featured the infectious melodies that they're known for. But overall I think most of the songwriting feel flat. Shannon seemed to be uninspired on some songs, often opting for just blasting away. The guitars seemed to be mushed together instead of being a harmonizing beast like it was on Nocturnal. I'm not sure why because the albums were produced by the same person. The bass was louder and I think that's great, but so was Trevor's voice which I feel should be put back within the music instead of on top of it. The solos were hit or miss, but were still more technical than they ever were before. The fact that Ryan is proficient in finger tapping is noticeable because on previous albums it sounded like every note of the solo was being picked, and that kind of took away from it's flow.
Overall that gives the album a 14/20 - 7/10. Fans of TBDM will surely want to pick the album up, and even people who have never heard them before will find certain tracks that they really like. It will remain in the shadow of Nocturnal (no pun intended), but I would even place Unhallowed above this effort. The album isn't bad, so don't take my review wrong. They are still one of my favorite metal bands, and I look forward to seeing them play these songs this winter. Metal and winter, is there no better marriage?
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Have a look at what mankind is up to now. And start preparing for the apocalypse, cause the end is nigh. 
