Nile "Ithyphallic"

Tracklist: 01. What Can Be Safely Written 02. As He Creates, So He Destroys 03. Ithyphallic 04. Papyrus Containing The Spell To Preserve Its Possessor Against Attacks From He Who Is In The Water 05. Eat Of The Dead 06. Laying Fire Upon Apep 07. The Essential Salts 08. The Infinity Of Stone 09. The Language Of The Shadows 10. Even The Gods Must Die Release: 2007 Genre: Brutal Death Metal URL: www.nile-catacombs.net Label: www.nuclearblast.de

The mighty Nile are definitely one of these kind of bands, on which you can count on. These guys are able to create qualitative and innovative Death Metal since years. That's something I can't say about many bands nowadays. As always the opinions about this band are very different. For some people they're the Death Metal epiphany and for others they're just dilettantes, which are bugging them with their Egyptian stuff. Personally I think that Nile is one of the best and most important Death Metal bands of our time. On their 5th full length album, they have parted from Relapse Records, which was there label for many years and have found with Nuclear Blast Records a new strong music label. The previous album "Annihilation Of The Wicked" was one of the best albums of the year 2005 in my opinion and it was definitely one of the highlights in the bands discography. So that won't be easy to outdo this masterpiece. On "Ithyphallic" you directly recognize, that the sound production is again a way more clean, than on the previous stuff. Well the sound is neat and you can hear all musical details very clearly, but in my opinion it sounds a little bit too clean and pedestrian. If you listen to the opening track, you can hear that Nile have damped there murderous speed a little bit and added more mid-tempo and groove parts. But that doesn't mean that Nile playing slow Six Feet Under or Obituary Death Metal now. They're definitely blasting like hell here again, but they including more room for tempovariations. In my view, they're acting sometimes too long in slow parts. Maybe it was a order from their new label, but that's just a personal suggestion, cause Nile is a untypically band for Nuclear Blast. On "Ithyphallic" Nile have been changed into a trio formation, because bass player Jon Vesano left the band. But you musn't waive of the bass guitar sound. Guitar player Dallas also recorded the bass guitar for the album. Apart from that, the line-up hasn't changed and I'm very elated about it in reason of the great technical skills of the members. The technical level of this record is breath-taking again. One point here which I didn't like is the fact that Nile have reduced the egyptian elements on this release. There's only one instrumental song (The Infinity Of Stone), which sounds like ancient Egyptian music. Well the song is really great, but way too short. Many people could argue now, that Nile is a Death Metal band and no Egyptian folkband. Yes that's right, however it could be possible to add one or two more songs of that style. But it's good to know ,that there is also a solo project from bandboss Karl, which is full of ancient egyptian music.Altogether "Ithyphallic" isn't Nile's best work, this album isn't able to excell the amazing predecessor. Compared to other releases of the band, it's weaker. Even it's maybe the weakest Nile release it's better and more qualitatively than many other Death Metal albums of this year. Anyhow you will still find some songs which are great and stirring. The "The Essential Salts" for example is very brutal but still with a great atmosphere, it's my favourite song of the album. Also the titeltrack is definitely one of the best too. Unfortunately there are some boring songs like the opening track "What Can Be Safely Written" for example too. Breath-taking songs in the veins of "Black Seeds of Vengeance" or "Lashed To The Slave Stick" are really rare here. I haven't found many great catchy guitar riffs, which are able to stick into your head on this album. It's a real shame, cause the band could make it better. Another negative point, are the lyrics in the booklet. I have to admit that I'm a hobby Egyptologist and i haven't found any explanations of the lyrics in the booklet. In my opinion that's another consequence of money save process of the label. Or maybe Karl was too lazy and he gives a shit about the needs of the fans now. Instead of that, you get a great cover artwork here. Ok this CD is definitely not the album of the year, but it's enough to get a good rating. In qualitive view there's a lot of quality served to the listeners ears. The playtime of nearly 50 minutes is amazing too and really rare in the American styled Death Metal scene today. By the way you can buy this CD also as a digipack version with two bonus tracks. But the bonus tracks aren't any unreleased songs. The songs are only instrumental versions of the songs "As He Creates So He Destroys" and "Papyrus Containing The Spell To Preserve Its Possessor Against Attacks From He Who Is In The Water". They won't win a price with this bonus stuff and I'm always pissed to pay more for this kind of bonustrack bullshit. You should decide oneself if you really need the more expensive digipack version or the normal edition. But maybe you have the same problem like me and don't have a chance to get the normal edition at the moment. My conclusion is, that this album no failure, but it isn't able to hold the quality of the previous album.

Rating: 81 % | from Gore | Date: 22.10.07 | Time: 03:00	shut down