After the Death of Man
Live Demo 2010
I’m just crushed with pity for Tempe, Arizona’s After the Death of Man. A young band faced with the age old quandary of scraping up the cash necessary to record a demo, the death metal mongers opted for a live recording – only to have a loose soundboard connection obliterate half their six song demo in unlistenable white noise.
That’s really a pity because the band – when you can hear them without inducing tinnitus – can craft a decent tune, sounding like a more recent and more technically adroit Kataklysm (the vocals are pure Maurizio Iacono impersonation). The live setting proves the band can pull off their churning, mid-gear death metal lashings, but it may not be the best format for showcasing the songs’ intricacies. After the Death of Man’s musical M.O. is whipsawing from molasses slow parts to army ant bursts of dexterous guitar lightning. Which is all well and good, but that loose connection starts injecting white noise into the mix during the third song, building to an ear splitting crescendo halfway through the fifth song. The good news is somebody on the soundboard caught it in time before momentous closer “Locus of Control,” the best song of the bunch which shimmers through washes of clean guitar glitter before exploding into crunching death metal obliteration.
You can check out Live Demo 2010 here.
1 comment:
Not really a fan. I just felt like nothing really stood out. Plus I hate that clean "slap back delay" tone because it just seems like a factory setting that mediocre bands through on for their arpeggios... I feel like a dick, but I'm just kind of surprised because they seem to be playing bigger shows...
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