Rating: 7.4

Country: Belarus

Release Date: 2006

Record Label: Relic Records/Sound Age Productions

Track list:
1. Dismay Symphony
2. Denounce to Abdication
3. Illicit Dissonance
4. Accusation In Existence
5. Predominant Madness
6. Perceive the Lie
7. Agony of Vainglory
8. Chastise by Cross
9. Catatonia (Suffocation Cover)

Total playing time 39:13

Band Website: Posthumous Blasphemer

Posthumous Blasphemer - Crucified Humiliation

Fiendharon - Guitars, Drums
Alexzonder - Bass
Biven - Vocals

Hailing from Belarus, a country known for… uh… being unknown, Posthumous Blasphemer assail us with technical brutal death metal inspired by Pierced From Within era Suffocation. While millions of Suffocation wannabes have preferred to imitate Effigy of the Forgotten (and almost all of them have been written off in my book as monosyllable "JUN" bands), very few have attempted to recreate Pierced From Within and even fewer have succeeded. Bands having that incredible distinction seem to have been forced to disband with their members having killed themselves and eaten each others testicles because of having to constantly deal with the unfair comparisons to that legendary album. It took a band from a country presumably as metal-ignorant as Belarus to unflinchingly do that, and deliver, and miraculously even live on to release their third full length album that is Crucified Humiliation.

Like an anaconda, Posthumous Blasphemer's thick, undulating music after surreptitiously reconnoitring your river-bobbing body during their mood setting intro, seizes it at once from the feet when the actual music begins, and then proceeds to enclose upon the body song by song, its grip tightening with every lapping riff around it. Suffocating brutality makes you gasp for air, propels you into a state of dizzy semi- consciousness for the lack of it and as it tosses and swirls and embarks on its murky underwater journey. Screeching leads escape your body in a final languishing attempt which linger in the air while you are dragged under submissively following a final squeezing attempt that proves to be fatal.

That is exactly what takes place; only I have been spared so that I can live to tell you watery cunts about the horrifying Crucified Humiliation experience. Throbbing brutal music with a disposition of sudden speed changes, like sitting in the backseat of a rattling truck that's driven by an edgy female driver, has been a prominent feature of Suffocation circa 1995 and it has been applied unabashedly on this album. To make it palatable for the contemporary listeners, it is brutalized and played at a faster pace whilst maintaining the same level of passion. Using the modern brutal terminology to expand on the album's essentially Pierced From Within sound, Posthumous Blasphemer's music uses selected elements of the first Defeated Sanity and the last Godless Truth album, with the involving technicality of the former and the slammy eccentricity of the latter. There are frequent moments of harmless indulgence where the band members are perceived to flirt with the technicality of Necrophagist and Spawn of Possession, involuntarily sticking their tongues out. Despite these additional attributes, their music is not insusceptible to sounding dull in the course of the album. What truly breaks the predictable pattern is the guitar interlude towards the end of "Agony of Vainglory"; an expansive segment that is reflective and melancholic, background music to the scene of your lifeless regurgitated body drifting slowly towards the surface of the water you were so brutally murdered in.

Posthumous Blasphemer's song writing is notably almost at par with that of Suffocation. Meticulously composed by Fiendharon, the songs are executed with a buoying momentum that should be in sync with that of your own. Tempo changes, plentiful in content, signify not just that; they are able to alter and project different moods through them. The leads, though scathing of nature, do not fail to bring out a stirring emotion or two in you. Biven's vocals are competent, comprising of monotone hoarse growls as opposed to the deep, grating and more expressive ones of Frank Mullen. The drumming is passable, with the blurry sound especially during the faster moments reducing its effectiveness. Alexandar's bass playing, an important factor here mind you, is indeed commendable. The audible twanging intertwines with the sound of the guitar, inducing the music to advance with an awkward gait, like a leggy model having to precariously make way through stumbling blocks abruptly interposed on a ramp, much to the delight of its thrill-seeking audience.

Crucified Humiliation is more than just a wholehearted attempt at recreating the magic of Pierced From Within; it is on its own a remarkable brutal death metal album by a band that is inching towards finding their own identity and ultimately a place on the shelf of every cynical death metal fan.

August 3rd, 2007