The Archaic Abattoir is one of those releases that has me scratching my head in confusion. On one hand, Aborted play really heavy death metal, sometimes called gore-metal due to the graphic and frankly gross nature of their lyrical content (with song titles like "Blood Fixing the Bled", "The Gangrenous Epitaph", and " A Cold Logistic Slaughter", do you really doubt it?), but metal that is expertly played with technical arrangements and precision riffing. On the other hand, much of the vocals here by Sven Caluwe are of the "cookie monster" grunt variety, and pretty laughable in spots. Not only can you not understand a word of it, but he almost sounds like a hog being led to a slaughter. In contrast, in almost every tune there are moments where Caluwe mixes in some melodic death screams amidst the inhuman grunting, which sees the band sound almost like early Soilwork or even Nightrage, two of Sweden's best melodic death metal bands. This is where this band really works best, but those moments are not long enough.
Granted, the guitar duo of Tace De Cloedt and Bart Vergaert rip into some killer harmony playing and savage riffs, and drummer Gilles Dellecroix is a star in the making, but I just don't see this band taking the next step until they decide how they want to present themselves vocally. If they want to continue on as a gore/grind band content on shocking their fans with graphic lyrical content and incomprehensible grunting vocals, then I'm sure there will always be a small audience for that. However, if they choose to work on that melodic death metal thing that they hint at here, I see much bigger things for this band. Let's see what happens.
Track Listing
1) Dead Wreckoning
2) Blood Fixing the Bled
3) Gestated Rabidity
4) Hecatomb
5) The Gangrenous Epitaph
6) The Inertia
7) A Cold Logistic Slaughter
8) Threading On Vermillion Deception
9) Voracious Haemoglobinic Syndrome
10) Descend To Extirpation
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