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Obituary: Left to die

05/09/08 || Lord K Philipson

After the magnificent milestone that is “Cause of death”, Obituary lost me. And they never managed to bring my interest back into the band. “Cause of death” is shock-full of bastardously (that can not be a real word) fine songwriting and riffs to die for. Still to this day the classic “Choooouuupped in hauuuuu!!!” screams bring tears to my eyes. Death metal tears. Now that’s some heavy shit. I should start a new band named Death Metal Tears. Anyways, here’s the latest offering from Obituary, a four song EP.

EP’s are irrelevant and it’s no different in this case. While almost re-living the super snare sound of “Cause of death” (one of the best snare sounds in the history of death fucken metal), “Left to die” sounds like the boring version of Obituary that we have grown accustomed to over the last 500 years. The most simple riffs around (apart from perhaps Six Feet Under) together with John Retardy’s undecipherable trademark grunts. On the first 2 albums that really worked coz the riffs and the songs had an unlimited amount of groove to them, now the riffs and songs are just there, grooving as much as a dead seal, making no one particularly happy.

What we get on this here EP is 2 new songs, a re-recording of the “Slowly we rot” tune (but why?) and a fucken Celtic Frost cover (like “Circle of the tyrants” wasn’t enough back on “Cause of death”). 4 songs in total then, so to say that we can dissect and cook this thing long enough to make it an extensive feature is an exaggeration.

The re-recording of “Slowly we rot” sounds fine, but it sounded fine already back at the original time of release so I don’t really see a reason to do this tune again. “Slowly we rot” (the album) has its moments but there are better songs to choose from when it comes to that album.

The title tune “Left to die” is a slow, typical Obituary thing that does absolutely nothing for me. It sounds exactly like any other of all those anonymous tracks Obituary have recorded and graced us with thruout the years. Not to mention that over 6 minutes of the same, slow death metal is not a format that works all too fucken well. It feels like I have all the time I need to re-invent the wheel while this tune drags on and on and on…

The other new tune, “Forces realign”, is following the same concept of slow, tiresome death metal with the trademark power chords Obituary love to use. Throwing in some semi-fast sections is not helping the overall feel either. The fast parts are hardly fast enough and the slow/mid tempo parts make you fall asleep. There’s no groove, no sections where I’m re-living the days of old and starts moving my head up and down, nothing. Just death metal. Slow death metal. Boring death metal. Who needs Valium when we have Obituary?

Celtic Frost is a band that Obituary obviously always had a knack for. Celtic Frost fucken suck, that’s all I have to say about that. A shit band being covered by a band that saw its glory days long ago is not exactly helping the song.

Boring as expected. I believe they are not even trying anymore. Actually, I don’t think they have tried since 1990. Should I even rate an EP? Yeah, I should.

3,5 out of 10.

By the way, is Human Trashcan Ralph Santolla even on this recording? I can’t hear any of his annoying solos…

Information
Released: 2008
Label: Candlelight
Website: www.obituary.cc
Band
John Tardy: vocals
Trevor Peres: guitars
Ralph Santolla: guitars
Frank Watkins: bass
Donald Tardy: drums

Tracklist
01. Forces realign
02. Dethroned emperor (Celtic Balls cover)
03. Slowly we rot (2008 version)
04. Left to die

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