Reviews list for Gorguts - Obscura (1998)

This album is a core influence upon much of what I can’t stand in modern trends of extreme Metal, so it’s no surprise I don’t like it very much. While a few Tech Death bands were already verging into what I call “Too-Progressive Metal” for the sake of pushing the skill envelope and showing off musical prowess, Gorguts took it a step further and created Dissonant Death Metal, which sacrificed all form of songwriting, riffing and memorable performance for the sole sake of creating something weird enough to continue pushing Extreme Metal in a… well, more extreme direction.

Much like how most Grindcore is simply taking things too far a lot of the time to prove they are the most fastest and most heaviest, so too does Dissodeath (at least in this Avant-Garde instance). Gorguts were more concerned with what they could do rather than what they should do. There is very little that is aurally pleasant on this album. The first song opens up with one of the most obnoxious guitar… leads, I guess, that I’ve ever heard. Atonal skronking, for what purpose? I guess cause it was new and unique. Then the guitar starts making some weird beeping noises, which is less offensive somehow. Atonal chords follow… Yeah, aside from the ever-impressive drumming and respectable talent, it’s just not my cup of tea. The songs jump around in sections so quickly there is no time to sit with anything they are trying to do. This leaves every song entirely unmemorable, save for the weird stuff they do that stands out (oh yeah, this is the track where the guitars sound like a choo choo train). Even the vocals started to wear me down, being a bit of a higher pitched bellow.

The worst part, for me, is that this totally worked for most people. Not only is the album hailed as a masterpiece, but so many bands took after them, deciding this insane new direction was the future. And yeah, it’s still going. A very unfortunate trend I see on many music discussion sites is that modern Metal isn’t worth your time unless it’s Avant-Garde Extreme Post Atmospheric Technical Progressive Metal. And that unfortunate obsession, all started right here…