Out Now
Metal Blade Records
Words Metal V
The announcement of each new Cattle Decapitation releases so many endorphins within this body and soul of mine. Having discovered them ten or so years ago they quickly became one of my favorite bands of all time. Concepts of the demise of our meat-selves and imminent destruction of the planet is about as heavy metal as you can get, because well, we can relate as we are now only trying to reverse mass extinction. Travis Ryan’s lyrics and vocals encapsulate these terrifying realities so perfectly that I think we are willingly going to fall into the depths of oblivion with him.
It was hard to imagine what trajectory Cattle Decapitation would veer onto after the devastating impact and finality of 2019’s Death Atlas, but now that Terrasite has seen the light of day, of course the new spawning of disgusting new human/cockroach hybrid emerging from the depths of our own destruction has been birthed. If you’re familiar with CD then you’ll understand my references, if not, well then you’ve been living under an unfortunate shell that you need to resurrect yourself from and discover the immense bleak and beautiful brutality artwork that Cattle Decapitation paints for us, also depicted beautifully on the album artwork by long time visual artist and collaborator Wes Benscoter.
Sonically the first half of Terrasite is typical CD that we are so fond of. This was chaotically obvious from the first video teasers – We Eat Our Young and Scourge Of The Offspring. The songwriting heard here, Josh Elmore’s scythe-like riff work accompanied by Belisario Dimuzio is next level perfect, Dave McGraw’s incessant mesmerizing blast beats with equal parts hypnotic pulse calming drumming, stunningly backed with bottom end pummeling Olivier Pinard on bass, Cattle Decapitation walk familiar territory, the sounds of which I am not upset about.
But it is the second half of the album starting with The Storm Upstairs that sonically really impacts the senses and shows us how CD as a five-piece have crafted the songs on Terrasite so intricately. There is a bar-raising essence of sonic brutality layered with a magnificent essence of melody not heard from CD previously all aspects of light and dark complementary to the audio chaos that Cattle consume us with.
Equal parts melody and malevolence. Travis Ryan’s vocals on Terrasite are absolutely raised to new levels of insanity, his ability to do trade-offs with himself are truly a wonder to hear, being able to be both demonic and angelic to get Cattle’s humanity musical message across crosses extreme metal barriers.
This conflict and combining of new melodic and malevolent is instantly recognised and revered from track 6 And The World Will Go On Without You followed by the excellent latest release A Photic Doom right through to the epic and superb 10-minute album closer Just Another Body which is easily my favorite track on the album.
Where to next for Cattle Decapitation is anyone’s guess but in 2023 they have once again proved to the world why they are one of the most cherished and revered extreme metal bands in existence.
★★★★
“We are just bodies
Insect parodies
Burning our hive
Remembering the crime that is our lives… that’s our history
Life in our prime
Reflection of a time where all is left behind“
*All reviews in HEAVY are just one person’s opinion of the album. We encourage honesty in reviews but just because our reviewer may or may not like/appreciate an album, that doesn’t mean their opinion is right! We encourage you to have a listen for yourself and make up your own minds!*
