[Image taken from en.wikipedia.org]
The explosive opening track, with a title I will not utter in polite company, immediately sets the tone for what the rest of the album contains. Crushing guitars, brutal vocals, pounding drums, and a steady bass groove make every song on the record worth your attention. “Crush The Industry” continues this theme, with many a intense riff all woven together seamlessly, providing a great sense of flow to everything. Things get even crazier with “Andromeda”, an in-your-face assault on the senses that will make you want to smash as many things around you as possible. With all of this energy and intensity, the album thankfully does not sacrifice any melody, providing enough harmonies and structure to the overall songwriting that are easily digestible (a problem I have with most death metal). This is mostly apparent in songs like “The Galaxy”, “Skyhunter”, “Biological Warfare”, and “Rejoin”, the latter being an incredibly effective closing track. While the album may not be quite as solid towards the middle (“Starved” and “Ghostqueen” didn’t quite grab me the way the others did), there is enough consistency to make Dethalbum III worth listening to all the way through.
The combination of Metalocalypse creator, Brendon Small, along with legendary drummer, Gene Hoglan, makes the third Dethalbum one of the best metal albums of the year, both in terms of songwriting and musicianship. This album can be enjoyed by just about anyone, from fans of the show to just fans of death metal and metal in general. Even if you hate most death metal (like I do), Dethklok have enough melody and structure in their songs to get you through the barrier to entry the genre contains. With this great gift finally in our possessions, all that is left is to wait patiently for Dethalbum IV…
