GRUESOME: “SILENT ECHOES”

(Here is Todd Manning‘s review of the tremendous new album by Gruesome, out now on Relapse Records.)

Critics love to beat up on bands that aren’t original enough, but to be fair, most bands try to downplay any obvious influences. Cross-continental death metal masters Gruesome are being very open about their latest album, Silent Echoes, due out on Relapse Records on June 6th. It is supposed to sound like Death’s 1991 masterpiece, Human. But the inspiration for such imitation comes from a very genuine, heartfelt place.

Drummer Gus Rios was mentored by and a close friend of Sean Reinert, the drummer who put such a unique stamp on the aforementioned classic record. Reinert passed away unexpectedly in early 2020, and Silent Echoes is a tribute to him.

photo by Ervin Novak

From the beginning, the resemblance is uncanny. “Condemned Identity” starts with a clean guitar played in a vaguely Middle Eastern mode, a songwriting device employed by Chuck Schuldiner throughout Human. When the band kicks in, they shift effortlessly from thrashing death metal to half-time grooves and back again. Matt Harvey adjusts his vocals to the dryer rasp of Schuldiner as opposed to the more grindcore-influenced approach he uses with his main band, Exhumed. The result is both familiar and new in the best possible way.

Possessed guitarist Daniel Gonzales is up to the task as well. He and Matt Harvey capture the essence of twisting, complex riffs written by Schuldiner, but rarely ape particular riffs. One exception, though, might be the halftime break in the title track, which bears a striking resemblance to a similar riff from Human’s “Flattening of Emotions”, but this similarity doesn’t distract from the impact of the music. The solos are excellent as well, both in the aggressive metal passages and in the more progressive, fusion-esque sections.

And the rhythm section deserves high praise as well. Just check the opening passage of “Frailty” where Rios plays a complex beat over the riffing while the bassist Robin Mazen plays a serpentine line around the notes. Rios echoes Reinert‘s sublime precision throughout, a steady hammering presence that complements the death metal riffing. He shines in the prog-inflected instrumental sections, adding a jazz-informed sense of nuance to the music.

Gruesome have always been open about the role Death has played in influencing their own music, but it takes a lot of ambition to explicitly state they are going to write a whole record inspired directly by what is perhaps Death’s most classic record. And it’s not just a matter of capturing a certain tonality or riffing style, Human was complex and progressive. Chuck Schuldiner, along with Sean Reinert, Paul Masvidal, and Steve DiGiorgio, were performing at the apex of the genre when they released Human.

Gruesome succeeds at the task, nailing the sound and composing a set of killer tunes. While they don’t quite get the absolute earworm hooks that Human possesses, every tune on Silent Echoes is still very memorable. It will not replace Human, but it will not disappoint. I for one can’t stop listening to Silent Echoes, and at the end of the day, that’s what it is really about.

https://orcd.co/gruesome-silentechoes
https://gruesomedeathmetal.bandcamp.com/album/silent-echoes
https://www.facebook.com/gruesomedeathmetal/