Rating: 8.8

Country: Finland

Release Date: 2007

Record Label: Osmose Productions

Track list:
1. Intro: Greater Wrath
2. The Antichrist Files
3. Mushroom Truth
4. You Don't Rock Hard
5. Pathogen
6. Pandemia
7. The Calling
8. Funeral for Despicable Pigs
9. Planet Nazarene
10. Blueprint for Your Culture's Apocalypse
11. Goat Justice
12. Die Insane
13. Original Pig Rig
14. Suicide Song
15. When Violence Commands the Day
16. Dead Return

Total playing time 50:28

Band Website: Impaled Nazarene

Impaled Nazarene - Manifest

Mika Luttinen - Vocals
Jarno Anttila - Guitar
Mikael "Arkki" Arnkil - Bass
Reima Kellokoski - Drums
Tomi UG Ullgren - Guitars

We're essentially a chemical reaction. No matter who you are, no matter how solidified your own self-image be, now matter how impervious you believe that nebulous concept of "self" to be against prevailing stimuli, all actions are a result of our intercourse with a complex tapestry of developmental and social factors. Have you ever felt that icy ball in your gut after hearing someone remark how "unlike you" one of your words or actions seemed to them? Nothing is more oppressive than allowing the concept of would you "should" be to dictate your thoughts and actions. I believe there exists a musical parallel to this fact; when bands are too conscious of the fact they have to live up to their legacy, they face a deadly forked road: a choice between stagnance and tepid experimentation. This band has dealt with that crisis with impeccable grace. Impaled Nazarene are regarded as one of the most consistent metal bands around, which isn't quite the case; they've had their mid-career slump, with somewhat boring albums like Nihil and Absence of War Does Not Mean Peace, which, at best, make for fun material in a live setting. But what's truly most consistent about Impaled Nazarene, ever since they grew out of Blasphemy/old Beherit worship and started playing cyberpunk thrash with a malignant range of influences ranging from power metal to ska to industrial, has been their irreverence towards what they're expected to be.

Just when you think you could be hearing an ultra-slick remaster of an old song from Sarcofago's INRI or Sodom's Agent Orange, Impaled Nazarene do a 180 degree turn and play a riff that could have easily be penned by anyone from Rotten Sound, to S.O.D., to Motorhead, each of these influences converging into a singularity of blackened thrash that feels like caffeine being pumped directly into your cerebral cortex. Self-confessed poor vocalist Mikka Luttinen does a fine job, displaying more range and focus than usual by experimenting with death growls and backing grindcore squeals while still indulging in that ear-shredding falsetto of his. His lethal, occasionally humorous (he pronounces his Vs like Ws, like a Satanic Elmer Fudd) Finnish accent remains, but he's clear enough that you can at least understand the stupid shit he's screaming without reading the lyrics now.

Tuomio was a fairly good guitarist, and penned several of this album's better songs, but the new guitarist Tomi UG Ullgren is the best thing to happen to Impaled Nazarene in years. For example, the axe-slinging in songs like "Planet Nazarene" and "Dead Return" is truly interstellar and epic, the latter song sounding like a lost (early) Paradise Lost number. Meanwhile, the leadwork gliding over the bouncy hardcore riffing in "Suicide Song" has an almost spaghetti Western feel. A campfire punk rock song about killing yourself; it's hard to determine whether this is more troubling or amusing, but for better or worse, it's an album highlight.

As always, the core of Impaled Nazarene is planted firmly in the oldschool. The high string thrashing in the obligatory goat number, "Goat Justice," is total Sarcofago worship. The combination of Impaled Nazarene's punk appeal and simple-minded obsession with sex, booze and Satan has always nodded towards Brazil, so it's hard to fault them on it. Then there's "You Don't Rock Hard," a string-bending, Discharge-esque jab at the sanctimonious moralists populating metal, while the shorter, grindier songs are here to remind you that this is the band that has roots in Belial. What could easily have been a conceptual disaster, the thrashy "Blueprint for Your Culture's Apocalypse” is actually one of the album’s best songs. Every metal band and their roadie nowadays think they're oh-so-edgy and topical by tossing some Eastern scales into a song with adolescent lyrics about the Iraq conflict, but Impaled Nazarene just happen to do it better than everyone else. That ridiculously frantic riff 30 seconds into it incites as much anxiety as the silly, fear-mongering lyrics are supposed to.

Lyrically, Impaled Nazarene are still anti-Communist and still pro-you killing yourself. For those who care, there’s also still a bit of intentionally provocative tongue-in-cheek homophobia and xenophobia lingering in their lyricism, albeit nothing as extreme as their song “Zero Tolerance.” If that offends you, you probably shouldn’t get this album, but instead, you might want to consider getting a sense of humor.

As usual with these guys as of late, the production job is excessively slick, but at least not to the point of sterility. It wouldn't hurt if the bass lines were a little higher in the mix; a healthy, rocking bass presence was one of the best features of the otherwise unspectacular Pro Patria Finlandia.

If Manifest has one glaring flaw, it's that it can prove to get a bit repetitive. Some of the verses in songs like “Mushroom Truth” (an otherwise excellent song, complete with trumpeting horns recalling the militant grandeur of Suomi Finland Perkele) and the sadly uneventful “Die Insane” seem padded out, as if the band decided at the last minute that the album needed a song exceeding two minutes in length. However, whenever I hear the massive crescendo of “Original Pig Rig," or the ridiculously awesome NWOBHM gallop of “The Calling,” my minor gripes dissolve into apathy and I’m consumed by an insatiable urge to kick hippies into pits of zombies. Nuclear goat metal! Fuck you!

Everyone has that one nostalgic band for whom they're a fervent apologist; that band that's obviously miles past their creative peak, and seem to linger around and produce new albums just to spite the fact that they should be chewing Werthers' Originals in rocking chairs while reminiscing on the good old days before these fancy MP3 devices and lead singers with bangs. For some poor tools, it's Metallica. For others, it's the crusty antics of Darkthrone. For me, it's always been Impaled Nazarene. Despite my fanboyism, I'm the first to admit they've been somewhat dated for the past decade or so -- even the neckbeard-stroking armchair philosopher twats at Anus.com give the band's post-Suomi Finland Perkele material more credit than I do. However, Manifest is aptly titled; it is the crystallized manifestation of the testicular fortitude that Impaled Nazarene have been trying to embody for years. Buy. If you don't like this album, it will at least give you something to listen to in your mom's minivan during your next trip to Hot Topic.

February 7th, 2008