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CADAVER
The Age Of The Offended

Nuclear Blast (2023)
Rating: 8/10

At the start of the 1990s Norwegian band Cadaver released a brace of cult classic albums in the form of Hallucinating Anxiety (1990) and …In Pains (1992), which followed on from several decent demos. In spite of these records being of high quality, Cadaver, like so many artists, succumbed to the 90s and wouldn’t release anything again until 2000 in the form of demo, Primal. For a few years the band altered its name to Cadaver Inc. which not only resulted in the album Discipline (2001) but also a lot of controversy which prompted the members to resort back to the original moniker, Cadaver.

By their 2004 platter Necrosis I’d somewhat lost track of the band and it seemed they had lost sight of themselves, even though it was a solid effort. Imagine my surprise then when the group re-emerged in 2020 with an EP, D.G.A.F., which was followed in the same year by a full-length entitled Edder & Bile.

I hoped the band wouldn’t disappear again and thankfully we now have The Age Of The Offended, their sixth full-length. Cadaver has always boasted an unorthodox flair, more so over the last 20 years, and with this release you get hit with the scowling vocals which drift menacingly on top of those groove-laden riffs.

Cadaver, for those not in the know, now encompasses a few styles; more so a black death snarl that is abrasive, twisted and mocking. No track is ever the same and with this album there is a lot to take in as there are 13 cuts, including the intro (‘Sycophants Swing’), yet only two run over four minutes.

The title track is a savage attack on the modern climate in regards to cancel culture and the likes, but most importantly it’s the seething riffs and scathing vocals which come to the fore. The same could be said for the excellent ‘Postapocalyptic Grinding’ and ‘Scum Of The Earth’, both angrily melodic and somewhat cold in their steely and nifty vibe. For me, other immediate standouts were the pacey thrash of ‘Death Revealed’ with its belligerent drumming, the gnashing ‘The Drowning Man’, and ‘Deadly Metal’, a short yet snappy affair featuring wild axe work.

With each listen other tracks came to my attention; the dissonant industrialised plod of ‘The Shrink’, the wailing and hammering ‘The Craving’, and the hyper black thrash of ‘The Sicker, The Better’.

While Cadaver has shifted its musical stance since the early days there has always been a certain special and very much secret ingredient which has enabled the band to concoct a rather peculiar extreme metal cocktail, and that element remains on an album that is sure to strike audiences hard.

Neil Arnold

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