Catafalc - Still Suffering

Rating: 7.3

Country: Estonia

Release Date: 2008

Track list:
1. Vituperated Mundane
2. Friendly Fire
3. Deviance
4. Will to Kill
5. Chopped by the Ripper
6. Mutilated to Ghoul
7. Fleshmarket Homicide
8. Organdealer
9. Still Suffering

Band Website: Catafalc

Catafalc - Still Suffering

Ando Enns - Guitar
Mihkel "Murx" Muru - Guitar
Eero "Nagy" Soomere - Vocals
Raino "Uziel" Suurna - Bass
Ken Takmazjan - Drums

Before I could even settle down in my judgement throne after pressing play, Catafalc came running from behind and began hacking away at my backside. “What the fuck?” I screamed aloud, “Who are these unmannerly people?”. “Sir, their unit is called Catafalc and they come from Estonia”, answered my emaciated half-naked servant while scratching his balls. “Ah, no wonder then”, I said appropriately and added, “Servant, I have heard of only one other band from that country, a brutal death metal act convincingly titled Neoanderthals”, to which he marvelled at my knowledge by way of a grimace and sat down cross-leggedly close below my throne so that his shoulders could have the honour of supporting my outstretched legs.

Still Suffering is decidedly a riff-driven brutal album which often wows you with the quality and swift execution of some of its pure death metal parts. This is in spite of the band's brutal demeanour, which, thanks to the production, does seem over the top. It sounds like a slurry mix of instruments that has dried off to form an uneven concrete wall of sound whose weight you have to bear on your chest, though every now and then you have an incisive riff reaching out and tickling your fancy. Influences vary with songs, sometimes it is just Cannibal Corpse riffs executed in the murderous stab-hack fashion of Deranged, other times it resembles a cross between the Morbid Angel-propelled brutality of Fleshtized and neck-breaking speed and slickness of Gomorrha. These of course are punctuated with massive chugs (the ones in “Friendly Fire” are deafening!) and vicious hooks that will neatly slice up parts of your body and toss it in places where even a canine sniffer won't be able to pick up. Then there are songs where their riffs sound quite different from all that; for instance, “Will to Kill” has a prominent Destroyer 666-like riff before the brutal parts chug-crash the party and pillage it in waves, and “Mutilated to Ghoul” features a terrific Jungle Rot groove that has Bolt Thrower touches – delusional Raino molests his bass guitar as though he's feeling up the body of Jo Bench. It is around this time that the album peaks, a worthy mention would be “Chopped by the Ripper” which is an intense thumping song that is very catchy for the most part, has superb riff sections and glorious screaming early Vader-like leads. There are several other occasions too where the band indulges in playing exquisite leads, a very welcome break from their overbearing brutality. Excluding “Organdealer” which has delectably brutal Morbid Angel riffs, the other two remaining songs didn't do much for me mostly because of their triteness. It's kind of like listening to your girl speak her mind – you love her and all that, but sometimes you just can't help ignoring her.

Catafalc show great potential no doubt, but they urgently need to get a sense of direction especially when their music isn't close to groundbreaking. Over here like a bum put on a bus, they are unsure where they are going and don't seem to mind either as long as they are going with the flow. Catafalc know how to write and execute good riffs and that is huge advantage for them, now if they could sort out their song arrangements and allot a calculated amount of brutality to it, I am sure it could work wonders for them. Oh, and get a better production next time. As for the verdict on Still Suffering, it is indeed decent, impressive even from where they come from (I had expected far worse), and worth giving a shot.

July 30th, 2008