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ZOMBIEFICATION
At The Caves Of Eternal

Pulverised (2013)
Rating: 6/10

At the caves of eternal what, I ask myself? Okay, so I’m being picky about the album title, but it’s no surprise to see a band with such a moniker. After all, zombies have been in vogue for a few years now, what with the popularity of certain console games, movies and television series’.

Anyway, Zombiefication are a bunch of Mexican death metallers who only have a handful of subjects on their mind – death, destruction and of course, lashings of gore. Before I press on, it’s important not to confuse these asylum escapees with an older Italian band, who dropped the “e” in their name. And it’s also worth noting that At The Caves Of Eternal is the Mexican’s second full-length opus, following on from 2010’s Midnight Stench debut and the 2012 Reaper’s Consecration EP.

As expected, Zombiefication do play slightly tongue-in-cheek splatter metal, which, for the most part, is quite easy on the ears, mainly due to the fact that they employ a sound that has more in common with old school Swedish death metal – think Grave and the likes. It’s often no thrills death metal with a few sprigs of blackened thrash thrown in. And the vocals of the mysteriously named Mr. Hitchcock are certainly of the throaty variety rather than intolerable bellows.

Zombiefication are in fact a two-piece, but you wouldn’t think so when you hear this blood-soaked racket. The drums are head-crushing throughout, and Mr. Hitchcock’s sidekick, the equally mysterious Mr. Jacko, has a lot to answer for with that rib-cracking bass and those often devastating guitars which fluctuate between frenzied thrash assault and doom-laden chainsaw chug.

The opening title track is very much an abrasive affair, combining the gloomy quality of Autopsy with that familiar Entombed-style bark. Sadly, the duo’s inability to wrench themselves away from the Swedish sound may grate on some a little.

‘Disembodied Souls’ lacks any identity with its pace, as does the equally rampant mass murdering structure of ‘Soul Collector’, but the black metal strains of ‘In The Mist’ and the gruelling slop of ‘Passage Of Darkness’ are certainly the album’s highest points. I only wish the gruesome twosome could concentrate more on the doomier aspects which they achieve on the gloomy ‘Passage…’; it’s easily the most atmospheric and effective track on the album, and comes complete with harsher vocals and Autopsy-styled melancholy. But while ‘In The Gallery Of Laments’ features an absolutely kick-ass drum, Zombiefication resort all too quickly back to that Swedish sound with the pacey ‘The Crypt’ and rather icy fingers of ‘In The Shadowed Garden’.

Although At The Caves Of Eternal makes for an enjoyable listen, the nine tracks on offer don’t really do enough to make the band stand out. Bands adopting that Swedish sound are too many at the moment, which can be rather sickly when you consider the amount of actual good Swedish bands doing the rounds.

The closing track, ‘Slaves Whisper Your Name’, should go a long way in confirming my initial fears that Zombiefication need to find their own identity, and until they do they’ll be just another zombie in that undead crowd.

Neil Arnold

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