### Hypocrisy: Abducted

#### 27/02/04 || Statik Majik

When Masse Broberg left Hypocrisy after the fantastic “Osculum Obscenum” album I was more than worried how well Peter Tägtgren could handle the vocals. Early 1994 I got the answer with their ep “Inferior devoties”. Peter wasn’t even near to Masse’s vox on that one, I tell you that. What was refreshing though that Peter didn’t even try to growl like Masse but concentrated on doing his own thing instead. Later the same year they released “The Fourth Dimension” and that finally got me back on Hypocrisy waggon. Maybe because of the reason that on that particular album the direction where Hypocrisy was heading at was more obvious than it was on the prior ep. I enjoyed “The Fourth Dimension” alot, not to mention that Peters vocals were ten times better than on the “Inferior Devoties”. But what really gave me a hard on was “Abducted”, which was released two years later. I’m definitely into conspiracy theories, ufo’s and such so maybe the artwork, songtitles and the lyrics on this album touched me. I don’t know…

First song, “The Gathering”, is a nice intro for the next song. Which is…

“Roswell 47”. The first time Peter screams in here, I totally forgot how much I missed having low growler on board. Peter is damn good “singer” and he makes more than a killer job here. The name of the song should be familiar to anyone who read news or watched movies. Aliens and stuff like that, you know. And does the song kick ass? Fuck yeah, it’s catchy as hell, good melody and it’s not too fast.

“Killing Art” on the other hand is quite the opposite. Faster than a speeding bullet. Szöke surely is on the roll here. The song slows down only abit in the middle, then gets catchier tempo for a little while and then it’s back to playing fast. Nice one.

“The Arrival of the Demons pt.2” is (obviously) continuation to the pt.1 presented on “The Fourth Dimension” album. It has the same melody and is actually a full song, pt.1 being an outro of the previous album and quite short. Either way, this is a killer track. For some reason I tend to like the slower songs from Hypocrisy more than their brutally fast ones. Go and figure.

“Buried”, well… again starts with a killer riff. Simple and heavy shit. Just the way I like it.

“Abducted”. Good basic song. Nothing fancy here, but does the trick.

“Paradox” on the other hand is a damn good song. Again the melody here is basic but still kind of “beautiful”. Especially in the end of the song, when Peter just screams over the melody. Needless to say that this one aint’t one of the fastest tracks either.

“Point of No Return” is slightly faster than “Paradox”, but not as fast as “Killing Art” for example. Again, like “Buried”, this one is pretty basic stuff. Except check out the short heavy parts of this song around 1:35 and 2:20. Something that I would like to see and hear live.

“When The Candle Fades” is again one of my favourite tracks from this album. Fucken heavy song with nice riffs during the verses.

“Carved Up”. Fast shit again. Shit in good way. Me likes.

“Reflections” is quite useless instrumental “song” if ya ask me. Could make a better outro. It’s probably put here to have small breather between the 9 fast songs of this album and the last two slow songs that end the “Abduction”.

“Slippin’ Away” is another favourite from this album. No growls or screams here, no blastbeats nor fast guitar gimmickry. The song is melancholic and slow but still very interesting.

“Drained” continues where “Slippin’ Away” ended. Slow song again. Not bad, but one is enough for me. Personally I think this is a song they could’ve left out from the album and put “Reflections” as the last song instead.

One thing that slightly bothers me in this album is the guitar sound. They’re clean and perfected, but to my musicwise unprofessional ears they sound somewhat… hmm, I don’t know… thin? But that’s not a big thing, cos it is a sound they have on all albums these days and I kind of got used to it already.

Oh yeah, the points…. If they’d have guitar sound similar to The Project Hate’s “Hate, Dominate…” album, or even similar to what Hypocrisy had in “Osculum Obscenum”, this would be a niner. But you can’t win them all.

8,5 /10

- Information
- Released: 1996
- Label: Nuclear Blast
- Website: www.hypocrisy.tv
- Band
- Peter Tägtgren: vocals, keyboards, guitars
- Mikael Hedlund: bass
- Lars Szöke: drums

- Tracklist
- 01. The Gathering
- 02. Roswell 47
- 03. Killing Art
- 04. The Arrival of the Demons pt.2
- 05. Buried
- 06. Abdcuted
- 07. Paradox
- 08. Point of No Return
- 09. When the Candle Fades
- 10. Carved Up
- 11. Reflections
- 12. Slipping Away
- 13. Drained