Paganizer - Dead Unburied

PAGANIZER - Dead Unburied (FOREVER UNDERGROUND - CD 2002)

Rogga Johansson and his Paganizer belongs to the most active and prolific death metal bands of the recent years. Basically every year brings us some new recordings! OK, to be honest, not all of them are totally great, some are little bit boring, some clearly have just material of fillers and mediocrity (like the split with Depression). But most of the full length albums of Paganizer are really awesome. Especially in the early 00’s the band has spawned several great albums and every next year another killer came. 2001 was a year of “Promoting Total Death”, then 2002 was the year of “Dead Unburied” (and then next year “Murder Death Kill” arrived and in 2004 “Divine Rapture”, another two fantastic albums!). “Dead Unburied” was again released by Forever Underground, what makes it quite hard to get nowadays (but it was re-released on a compilation with first three Paganizer albums)… But believe me, it is worth getting.

When listening of “Dead Unburied” there’s one thing, which strikes you from the beginning and which when compared to the “Promoting Total Death” album is a great advantage and improvement… and that is the production of “Dead Unburied”. The album was recorded in the Sunlight Studio with Tomas Skogsberg. More so, the mastering was fixed by Dan Swano… So, two masters of the Swedish death metal sound are responsible for this record! And you can hear it; the sound on “Dead Unburied” is fantastic. It is brutal, the guitar tone is low, fat and heavy, the whole music is like a bulldozer of Swedish death metal. And finally, also Rogga’s growl is kind of deeper and better. So, in this aspect I think that “Dead Unburied” is a great improvement when comparing to the previous album.

Musically maybe the difference is not as big, because both albums walk the same path of brutal, crushing mid tempo death metal in the vein of Grave (who else hehe!). Paganizer didn’t really change much when comparing to the previous album, but maybe the one, but quite important modification, is the fact that on “Dead Unburied” there are many more faster, blasting parts, what only makes the whole album even more aggressive and massive. Really, quite many songs on this album have the tempo increased, so imagine how the whole music sounds, with this crushing production! It is just a death metal slaughter! Just listen to such killer songs as “Even In Hell”, “Napalm Burial”, “Flesh Supremacy”… So, with such fast songs, in many ways, this album is better than its predecessor, more ultimate, devastating piece of old styled death metal. I also must mention such slower masterpieces as “Beyond Redemption”… and yes, what a killer stuff is here! It is just a shame that Forever Underground Records didn’t do much to promote the album at the time of its release...

Standout tracks: “Even In Hell”, “Landscape Made of Human Flesh”, “Flesh Supremacy”, “Beyond Redemption”

Final rate: 75/100