Rating: 7.9

Country: Czech Republic

Release Date: 2007

Record Label: Nice To Eat You

Track list:
1. Infested Land
2. Publicity Campaign
3. God, Bless to My Killing
4. Manipulation
5. Human Misery
6. God of Death [mp3]
7. It was Devil
8. Real Hell
9. Shame to Heart of Europe

Total Playing Time: 32:03

Band Website: Martyrium Christi

Martyrium Christi - We Will Kill ... for You

Karel Tomasek - Guitar, Vocals
Petr Kalcik - Guitar, Vocals
Pavel Jurek - Bass, Vocals
Martin Krc - Drums

Martyrium Christi's prime mover Karel Tomasek ensures that the listener is thrown headlong into a vortex of colliding rocks an instant after the play button is punched. Brutal, bass-thick and gritty with 7-string intensity; nothing new but the bilious delivery creates a refreshingly abusive mauling. The triple vocal attack deviates around a Sinister-like hub with more guttural and distressed variations. A post-chorus razor harmony is the precursor to a drop in hyperactivity (a Benediction-tilted shuffle) and somehow the word "Extirpation" is belched out with at least one extra syllable. Please don't expect me to explain the meaning of "crazy visions of the fowls grower" or other badly translated miscellany throughout the lyrics. Who cares? All you need to know is that these guys are vehemently anticatholic and, just like Origin, have a rather breathtaking overdrive capability.

"Publicity Campaign" has a Kataklysm air to it; a blasting barrage over an imperious but civilised tremolo-picked riff. The same goes for the start of the third track, which jumbles pace and technicality more readily. If the truth be told, the mood has cooled since the frenetic album opener. Neanderthal chugs, catchy grooves and a greater inclination for melody give the majority of the album an unexpected old-school vibe. The second lead on "God of Death" is a half-minute indulgence of merit but it is relatively lacking in aggression and originality at this point.

Gleefully "It was Devil" gets the MC train back on course. A baleful introduction formed from a slow chord progression of latent menace harmonised with a low rapidly twitching undercurrent leaves an ambivalently majesterial and nasty impression in the mind. An arrogant backing riff under a solo of piercing slides and hyperfretting remind strongly of Morbid Angel. "Real Hell" is a delight. Notes spatter and chords hammer in a fast evolving and unmerciful track that uses thick layering and atonality to great effect (drawing parallels with Hate Eternal's I, Monarch). The final track is characterised by sudden injections of phenomenal speed but has a surprising warm interlude showpiecing a graceful and commendable lead.

If Martyrium Christi keep on making material like this they'll build a fanbase for sure. However, when they take the speed up a notch their untapped potential blasts through like a gamma-ray burster. Untamed, visceral rage seem to penetrate through the faster they go. Faster, damn you, faster!

August 5th, 2008