Asphyx are true death metal legends from the abyss of The Netherlands. Their slithering, doomy aural hell had pleased the most lunatic brains among metal music freaks since 1987. The band broke up in 1995, but re-emerged next year with a new line-up featuring ex-vocalist Theo Loomans (played also all bass and guitars on this one) and forming member, drummer Bob Bagchus.

This was when I became familiar with Asphyx. For those who knew the band already, with 'God Cries', something a bit different was presented, due to the changes in the line-up. The band were faster, thanks to the thrash metal facet they had found during the break. Still today, this album is an individual take of thrash-mixed-up-death metal with some HC/rock attitude (dissonant and open-string guitar playing). Within these songs, the band shoot with both the straight and less straight riffing and the drum fire. The keywords are catchy and in-your-face. At times reminding me of Sodom, at times of old Pestilence, 'God Cries' stands on its own four feet, asserting itself with the ripping bursts of frenzy. On 'My Beloved Enemy' the band enter surprisingly melodic and emotional grounds, but still do it with style. No, this is no emo-core (as mentioned in some review on the internet), this is reality. 'Died Yesterday' and 'Frozen Soul' have some late Carcass and Blackstar style heavy rocking in it. Even though being different to usual Asphyx, the similarities are still many.

Another component that's keeping up the frenzy are the performances. Mr. Loomans's vocals are throat-lacerating mixture of shouting and growling, not a million lightyears away from the voice of "true" Asphyx vocalist Martin Van Drunen (ex-Pestilence, ex-Comecon). He spits hateful messages against Christianity and its God, backstabbing "friends", about insanities of wars, and about death and dead feelings. You can hear his anguish and hate, and apparently he took his life soon after this album was out. The guitar sound is ear-rendering, and there is a lot of live touches left intact in the mixing. The drums are pounding, but cardboard box sounding tom drums are out of place on this record. The bass guitar is there doing its job, but is far less audible as on Sodom releases, for example. There's a lot of room in the production, and it would have been bloody brutal, if it was squeezed a bit more.

This works as a demonstration how one can say "fuck off" without saying it. Fuck, there's the word "fucking" said once. Anyways, if you want to try some rabid death/thrash metal, you could do much worse than to headbang yourself insane to 'God Cries'. This isn't a typical Asphyx album, but still deserves to be heard!

Rating: 7+ (out of 10) ratings explained

Reviewed by Lane
10/10/2007 11:47