Death metal certainly has its share of AC/DCs that is to say, bands who seem to release the same album year after year. I can't think of too many bands who receive this accusation more than Deeds of Flesh (Bolt Thrower immediately comes to mind though). For the most part, the accusations are justified, and that can be either good or bad depending on who you are. I've been a Deeds fan for some time now, so it's obviously the former in my case. But for those who've only heard their recent work and weren't impressed, this may be for you.
Don't get me wrong; this debut has pretty much all the ingredients that would later define their sound: sinister, often atonal tremolo-picked riffing, sudden time and meter changes, and relentless blast beats with double bass footwork that never seems to let up (including that "triplet blast" beat they make frequent use of, found here on "Blasted"). But there are small differences. The guitar tone is perhaps a bit tinnier (probably because the mids are scooped as much as possible, in keeping with the traditions of brutal death metal), yet they compliment the music and definitely accentuates this disc's other unique traits.
The band also seem to pace themselves a little more here than on later efforts. Never ones to make heavy use of those Suffocation-ish breakdowns that many of their brutal peers seem to soil themselves over, trace amounts of them can still be heard in tracks such as "Hunting Humans", "Acid Troops", and "Deeds of Flesh." But whereas some bands seem to strategically plant them into many of their songs, they flow well within the context of the songwriting here.
Erik Landmark's vocals are of a fairly standard deep, guttural variety---enough so that you often can't decipher lyrics, but never to the point where he begins to sound more like a pig or cricket or whatever other animals some death metal bands tend to put behind the mic. You can also hear plenty instances of the dual high-low vocal parts they'd later come to employ frequently.
Perhaps the element that separates "Trading Pieces" from the rest of their later catalogue, however, is the song lengths. Most of the tunes here clock in at under 3 minutes, the only exceptions being "Carnivorous Ways" and "Acid Troops." Personally, I think that 2 or 3 minutes is just the right length for most death metal songs, especially with this particular style (Gorgasm is a prime example of this principle), and this may be where some of Deeds' later songwriting would fall short, as their last 3 albums contain virtually no songs under 4 minutes (Upon closer inspection, the only one is "This Macabre Fetish", at 3:58).
Deeds of Flesh aren't exactly reinventing the wheel, but that was never their goal. They have, however, managed to carve their own little niche of twisted, pummeling, blasting savagery within the brutal death metal field, and I would definitely place this among the best in the genre.
Tracks
- Carnivorous Ways
- Born Then Torn Apart
- Trading Pieces
- Hunting Humans
- Impious Offering
- Acid Troops
- Deed of Flesh
- Erected on Stakes
- Chunks In The Shower
- Blasted
- Untitled
If you like it, please buy it on their official website/merchandise.
Deeds of Flesh - Trading Pieces (1996)
This review published by Jreg on Metallum
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