Review by Rexorcist for Nile - Annihilation of the Wicked (2005)

After Nile's third album, In Their Darkened Shrines, took the metal world by storm, the upped the heaviness ante with their most popular album, Annihilation of the Wicked.  Nile cemented themselves as one of the most capable death bands of their time, but this album ensured their historical status.  After having heard this before and heard Darkened Shrines today, I had to play this one again.

Now this album just blasted brutality in my face once its acoustic intro was done and "Cast Down the Heretic" began.  This is Cryptopsy level brutality.  Of course, the next track, Sacrifice Unto Sebek, followed suite perfectly, without even letting up.  Although this is potentially a con considering that their previous album had made a point of displaying the diverse range of their one genre, the fact that they kept the brutality and technicality just as strong while keeping the song short says that this song acts more like an epilogue to our first song.  Our next track is the epic "User Maat Re," which starts off with an intro and style similar to the first two songs, so it doesn't feel very original.  However, its varying songwriting structures are consistently played throughout the whole nine minutes to keep it original.  But when "The Burning Pits of the Duat" started, it was obvious to me that this album wasn't going to change its pace like the previous album did.  In other words, it's only going to rely on the band to try and keep the most basic and generic sound that was already pioneered and perfected by Suffocation original.  Thankfully, the writing was still incredibly strong.

The album sacrifices much of the mythological and even horrific vibe of the previous album for more brutality, almost like they sold out.  But this is an exceptionally brutal album with a lot of raw talent behind it.  They obviously didn't sell out because they wanted more brutality and succeeded.  But they lost a piece of themselves thanks to the transition, so this almost cosmic vibe about their previous album was gone.  But the death metal performances themselves still denoted that this had an incredible amount of effort put into it, so I won't fault it too much.  Sameyness may be a slight problem, but some of the finest death metal performances I've heard are here, so I'll still consider it one of their best.  But I also feel like there's a bit of a case here like South of Heaven or Pleasure to Kill where the heaviest is considered the best based on that and not on the writing quality.