Obsessör hails from Germany, and is a
4-piece group playing some intense black/thrash metal. Only a few years removed
from their debut album, the band is releasing their second full-length album: “Assassins
of the Pentagram”. This album is violent, vicious, and contains not a single moment of
compromise. The music is always fast, and the riffs are as old school as
possible. One area where Obsessör does go a bit of a different direction is in
the vocalist. Their singer does more growling than screaming or yelling. In
this sense, he’s not dissimilar from a standard death metal vocalist, but his
technique is a bit more gravelly. The most interesting part of this vocal
performance is the high-pitched shrieking. No doubt this is paying great homage
to the mighty Schmier (Destruction), as there are many parts where Obsessör’s
vocalist hits absurdly high notes that are incredibly comical (though quite
awesome as well). These moments occur often, and in pretty much every track,
and are a great way to break up the monotony of a more one-dimensional vocal
approach.
Musically Obsessör doesn’t bring a lot that
is new to the table. There’s nothing wrong with that. The tried and true
formula of speed, great riffs, and shredding solos is always a winner. Perhaps
a slight criticism could be levied on the band because of the lack of
simplistic songwriting. To be fair though, black/thrash is a really dirty style of
metal that gets at the roots of less complex bands like Venom. In any case this doesn’t
really hurt “Assassins of the Pentagram” very much because there is always
something worthwhile going on. While this makes it difficult to pick out
individual favourites, it means that the entire album is an enjoyable listen. One
thing that didn’t seem particularly effective, however, was the use of blast
beats. They appear in “Hordes of the Goat Kult” and the cover of Destruction’s “Devil’s
Soldiers”. The biggest problem is that they’re a little bit slow, and it makes
the tempo of the music feel less rapid than if a standard thrash/punk beat were
to be used. Nevertheless, these occurrences are so few and far between, that they
do no major damage to the quality of the record.
The production on “Assassins of the
Pentagram” is pretty solid. The drums are not overproduced and are very natural
sounding. This is particularly noticeable in the snare sound, which cracks
nicely. Additionally, the bass is near the forefront of the mix, and though it
does not take focus often, it is always contributing something worthwhile. The
guitars fit in well, with a bit of a buzz to them. Everything is mixed
appropriately, and there are really no complaints about the production. With “Assassins
of the Pentagram”, Obsessör has put together an impressive effort. Anyone who
prefers their metal to be witching and/or blasphemous is sure to enjoy this
effort!
Highlights
All of it.
Final Rating
4.2/5 or 84%.
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