Review by Daniel for Entrails Eradicated - Viralocity (2010)

Australian technical death metallers Entrails Eradicated were first brought to my attention back in 2012 when I read that they had picked up one of the highly sought after support slots for the upcoming Cannibal Corpse Australian Torture tour due to take place in October of that year. I generally like to take the opportunity to check out the support bands in advance to see if they're worth rocking up early for so I tracked down this EP. Rightly or wrongly the bands name left me with the immediate impression that Entrails Eradicated would sit comfortably inside the confines of the brutal/slam death metal genre which was fine by me as I’ve always loved the more brutal end of the extreme metal spectrum. However the band may live to regret going for a title like Entrails Eradicated as it will immediately bias people against them if brutal death metal is not their genre of choice. Those thoughts were reinforced once I’d actually checked out the bands material which is certainly more ambitious than what your average brutality merchant has on offer. 

Entrails Eradicated is the brainchild of Jim Parker who decided to form an as-yet-untitled technical death metal band in Perth, Western Australia in 2007. Jim recorded a single promo track with the title “Entrails Eradicated” which appears in a renamed form on this E.P. under the title “Harnessing Gravitational Endurance”. He then used the promo to attract talented musicians from the local Perth death metal scene. Guitarist Lynton Cessford (Gallows For Grace/Malignant Monster) was recruited alongside vocalist Tarren Whitfield (Visceral Mutation/ex-Grotesque) & drummer Ben Craig (Arterial Hemmorrhage/Blowtorch Abortion) to form a very experienced & competent death metal unit. It seems the band elected not to recruit a permanent bass player as I can find no record of one ever existing. I can only assume that they've used a session bassist when recording or that Jim has played the basslines himself (which would be no mean feat if that is the case). Once some more material was written the band decided on the band name & recorded a single track promo for “Impending Annihilation” (2008) & a two track one featuring “Collapsible Continuum” & “Viralocity” (2009) which are all present on this EP. 

The next step for Entrails Eradicated was obviously to get a proper release on the shelves so the decision was made to self-finance the recording of an E.P. showcasing their best material to date. Hence this E.P. was recorded in April 2010 & rushed out to coincide with the band’s debut live performance at the 2010 Bali Extreme Metal Fest on 12th June 2012.  It strikes me as a strange release really. The fact that the whole E.P. clocks in at just over 15 minutes (which amounts to about 10 minutes of metal after you exclude the intros & interludes) & that it only really includes one previously unrecorded song of 1:18 in duration hints that this is all of the material the band had to work with after 3 years together. That’s really not a lot of material. But in saying that, all of the older material here has had plenty of time to evolve & is now very tight & well presented. 

Intro track “Visceral Winds” strikes me as something I’d expect Morbid Angel to use as an introduction to their live shows. It’s a menacing gothic march full of the type of foreboding atmosphere that made Wojciech Kilar’s soundtrack to the 1992 “Bram Stoker’s Dracula” film so captivating. The similarities are striking & I’d guess that they are probably not a coincidence. 

“Harnessing Gravitational Endurance” blasts in quite suddenly at the conclusion of “Visceral Winds” & gives us a good taste of what Entrails Eradicated have on offer here. It was an obvious selection for the opening song as it is the most brutal track of the five. I think it's probably my favourite track too which is in no small part due to a slightly more straight-forward approach than the other more recent tracks. I believe they open with this track when playing live too which is not too surprising either. It’s immediately evident that Entrails Eradicated’s sound follows a similar path to ultra-technical death metal bands like Origin (USA) & Obscura (Germany). Everything flies past at lightspeed. The riffs are highly technical with sweep-picking being used heavily in the riffs. The drumming is frenetic throughout with a heavy use of blast beats. No time can be spared for breakdowns or guitar solos as Entrails Eradicated prefer to use that time for dark ambient/industrial interludes & outros like the one at the end of this track. 

If “Harnessing Gravitational Endurance” doesn’t immediately grab your attention then I wouldn't bother moving forwards as subsequent tracks like “Impending Annihilation” & “Viralocity” (for which they released a promotional video) are very much along the same lines. The new inclusion “Disintegrating Complex Entities” is a short sharp blast that doesn’t really give you time to think before it’s all over. “Collapsible Continuum” is probably the least impressive track due to its heavy reliance on neo-classical guitar riffs. This is probably a good time to tell you that I am NOT a fan of the whole sweep-picked riff trend that is plaguing the death metal scene at the moment & Entrails Eradicated use it fairly heavily in every track which I find particularly wanky. It would be so much more impressive & exciting to hear if it was used more sparingly. There is also a strong case here for including more variation in tempo & style but it seems the band are pretty happy with their constantly fast & brutal approach. Time shall tell whether that will keep listeners interested over multiple releases; especially over the course of a full-length album.  

 Lyrically, all of the tracks on the E.P. are interlinked by a common concept. The idea is that all of the negative energy being created by the human race will eventually be absorbed by the Earth & will result in the planet itself becoming an all-consuming incurable virus that infects the rest of the cosmos at an ever-increasing rate. So “viralocity” is basically a virus travelling faster than the speed of light. Ooookkkaaayyy!! So it’s a bit of a far-fetched idea but at least it’s something different from the run-of-the-mill guts-&-gore style followed by most other brutal death metal bands. 

Entrails Eradicated were lucky enough to be able to secure the artistic skills of the legendary Jon Zig for the cover art. If you're reading this review then you will definitely be familiar with Jon’s work on dozens of brutal death metal albums from bands such as Suffocation, Dying Fetus, Inherit Disease, Septical Gorge, etc. Here he has managed to present the bands concept very well with a depiction of mutated humans being sucked from the Earth by the viralocity (which is displayed as a big spiraling tunnel of evil). It’s pretty suitable really. 

There can certainly not be any doubting the musical abilities of the band members. Both guitarists put in faultless displays of virtuosity here. They certainly look the part too. The promotional video for “Viralocity” shows they are both heavily tattooed & look suitably impressive whilst thrashing away over their matching BC Rich Ironbird guitars. Drummer Ben Craig takes a more brutal approach than other technical death metal drummers. There are none of the progressive fills here. Ben is more focused on blinding speed & precision & he pulls it off very well indeed. The triggered snare sound could probably do with some work as it’s not as powerful as it could be but the rest of the production is very good. The guitars are up higher in the mix than the drums but everything is clear. The bass playing is exceptional too so I’d really like to know who is responsible for it. There are plenty of bass sweeps & tapping employed to good effect. Vocalist Tarren performs admirably too with a combination of deep gutteral & higher pitched screaming employed throughout. 

Overall, while I am very impressed with most elements of “Viralocity”, it is still lacking in one key department. As impressive as the technicality is it doesn’t really demand repeat listens. I find this to be a common problem with this particular sub-genre of death metal. Entrails Eradicated are a bit of a one-trick-pony in this respect. They need to work on writing more memorable songs with more variation as otherwise a full-length album in this style is going to become stale pretty quickly. Apparently the band has been writing material for their debut full-length for many years now so there’s been plenty of time for them to reflect on things & to develop accordingly. Why do I get the feeling that we are in for more of the same though? Regardless, fans of the new breed of technical death metal bands will not be disappointed with “Viralocity” as it fulfills what it set out to do very well indeed. It certainly did enough for me to ensure that I showed up early to see what they were like in a live environment later on that year. Unfortunately the experience was ruined by some awful sound problems.