Hypocrisy - Abducted (1996)Release ID: 5174
A little unfocused, but Abducted contains some great Hypocrisy moments.
While reviewing Hypocrisy’s earlier albums, I’ve made numerous mentions to the fact that Abducted is where this Swedish band really found their sound. Penetralia and Osculum Obscenum were straight-ahead death metal albums and while they were entertaining, they didn’t exactly raise the bar of creativity. The Fourth Dimension found the band toying with melody successfully and it was the first Hypocrisy album that had good variety among the tracks, which is something they’ve certainly run with from that point onward. Which brings us to Abducted, often considered the band’s best album out of the 11 they’ve offered up so far. I have to say going back to it now after all these years has been a mixed experience for me. I expected to find Hypocrisy in top form, having ironed out all the flaws that had slightly dented their early work, but in the end, I’ve been left slightly underwhelmed. Don’t get me wrong, Abducted is indeed an improvement and an essential album for fans of the band, but it’s not the 4.5 to 5 star album that I always thought it was.
On the negative side, the band seemed to be trying to tick too many boxes on Abducted. I know variety is a good thing and it’s one of Hypocrisy’s strengths, but the whole thing can become a bit messy when you’re attempting to achieve too many goals. The album contains ballads (which seem to be strangely grouped towards the end), a symphonic instrumental piece, melodic epics, as well as a few pure, unadulterated death metal tracks. Not all of it works (particularly the ballads) and I can’t help feeling the band should have utilized the great sound they found on tracks such as Roswell 47 and The Arrival of Demons (Part 2) a little bit more. It’s also noticeable that quite a few tracks finish abruptly before they have run their course and I find myself wondering why a track is fading out when it should be working the mood it has worked so hard to create. I think these flaws display a band that hasn’t quite nailed their formula and despite my nostalgic feelings towards Abducted, I have to admit that it’s far from perfect.
On the positive side, Roswell 47 is a brilliant start to the album. Melodic yet crushing, it’s quite possibly the best track they’ve ever produced, and a perfect example of what Hypocrisy are all about. The science fiction / alien abduction theme comes out beautifully in the sound and it has an epic feel to it that I wish they’d utilized for the whole album. Killing Art continues the good work while dropping the melody for a full-on death metal assault complete with brutal drumming and shredding riffs. Tagtgren utilizes numerous vocal styles to fit the mood of each track and while he might not quite be up to the slower, ballad-like moments, he can scream, growl and roar with great results. The musicianship is pretty good throughout, although it must be said that they still struggled to write good solos at this stage. All things considered, Abducted is a fine album that has numerous great moments (Roswell 47, Killing Art, Paradox and Abducted), but due to the aforementioned flaws, I’m not quite sure that I’m willing to call it their best work as I once did.
