MEMORIAM
NUCLEAR BLAST A gleeful but grim opus memorandi from death metal veterans
Given the relative scarcity of 21st-century Bolt
Thrower and Benediction material, Memoriam’s fruitful album-a-year output since they emerged in 2017 has been a boon for UK death metal aficionados. And while their formation to honour late family and bandmembers afforded them a generous grace period, the voracious mid-tempo rumbling and baleful harmonies of For The Fallen and The Silent Vigil were both worthy of their members’ more lauded past efforts. It’s unsurprising, then, that Requiem For Mankind is more of the same but better again, building on the strengths of Andy Whale’s understated but rigorous drumming, Karl Willetts’ unmistakable bellowing roar and Scott Fairfax’s potent six-string summoning, wielding monstrous death metal hooks that slam into the cranium and gut with even more shattering results. Opener Shell Shock’s thrashing drive that calls to mind bassist Frank Healy’s tenure in Cerebral Fix is as fast as proceedings get, with the album reaching its nadir on the doom-laden tracks
In The Midst Of Desolation and Refuse To Be Led’s mournful atmosphere, as tar-thick and steel-enforced as we’ve come to expect. Willetts indulges his trademark stories from the battlefield on Undefeated and the thunderous Fixed Bayonets, while the title track and Austerity Kills turn his coherent but caustic vocals to the unmitigated catastrophe of these ever-worsening times. The Veteran oozes with acerbic filth that works best with Russ Russell’s raw production, which still helps the regal peaks of Never The Victim climb to a riveting pinnacle. Other death metal bands may be taking the genre into ever more complicated and terrifying realms but the years of graft under Memoriam’s collective belts ensures their raison d’être is still devastatingly effective, and pulled off with such enthusiasm that Requiem For Mankind is as gleefully riveting as it is a depressing indictment of the world into which it’s been spewed.
FOR FANS OF: Bolt Thrower, Benediction, Vallenfyre