Review by Ben for Atheist - Elements (1993)

Disappointing yet still entertaining last album by these insanely gifted musicians.

Just check out the genres currently listed for this album to see just how creative and original it is. Technical and progressive death metal, with touches of thrash metal and jazz fusion should be enough to let you know this isn't your run of the mill death metal outing. Atheist's first two albums had already combined these elements (unintentional pun) to form brilliant, yet still extremely heavy albums. But the third and last release in my opinion takes things just a little too far and ends up being a still entertaining, yet flawed album. When things come together, such as on Air and Mineral, this is just as good as their more renowned releases. But unfortunately, a lot of it suffers from a lack of focus (another intentional pun for those in the know) and energy, with a few tracks feeling a touch under developed.

The musicianship as always is jaw dropping and the production is perfectly fine. I love it when extreme metal bands give the bass room to breathe and this is an example where you can hear it the entire time. Shaefer's vocals are a bit less chaotic on Elements than on Piece of Time and Unquestionable Presence and that suits the lighter intensity of this album. The four little instrumentals are all perfectly nice, but none of them really add to the album (except for Samba Briza which is a full-on jazz piece) and seem to be just filling up time. It may sound like I don't enjoy Elements but that's not true at all. It's just very difficult not to compare it to the band's former glories and it must be said that it's the lesser of the three. Still, if you want to hear some death metal that's filled with technical proficiency and unusual instrumentation, this should be very high on your list.