Morbid Flesh - Rites of the Mangled

MORBID FLESH - Rites of the Mangled (UNHOLY PROPHECIES - CD 2017)

It's been a while since Morbid Flesh released anything ("Embedded in the Ossuary" came out in 2014), I am very, very glad then that "Rites of the Mangled" is out. I have to say that I've been playing this CD for some time now and the more I listen to it, the more I like it. I do realize that this album doesn't provide anything new or groundbreaking to the whole death metal genre. I do know also that it has very small chance to become the death metal album of the year... at least to most of the people. But personally, I have to say that this album just fuckin rips my guts out and kills with no mercy, bringing exactly my favourite type of death metal. It ticks all the boxes of "what I like about this style of music the most". And more importantly, everything on this album sounds excellent, the whole performance is top notch and the songwriting and arrangements are perfect. Definitely it's Morbid Flesh's best effort yet, it shows great step forward, even compared to also great "Embedded in the Ossuary" EP... Yeah, it's sweet fuckin death metal torture and beast of an album. 

Morbid Flesh definitely takes a lot of influence from the Swedish death metal, but I would rather say that they're playing traditional European death metal in general. Why? Well, obviously they have the production, which is pretty close to the classic Swedish sound. They also come up with many fantastic harmonies, which normally characterize classics like Dismember or Goddefied. They also have a bit of Entombed-esque groove. But there're also many killer doomy parts or more brutal and vicious parts, which would bring to your mind some Finnish, Dutch or German classics. The melodic part of "Rites of the Mangled" is truly excellent, I mean take a listen to such "Incantation" for instance. The ending part of this track is wonderful and harmonies are as good as those from "Like an Ever Flowing Stream", in my opinion.  

Anyway, it doesn't even matter what inspires Morbid Flesh to compose such crushing death metal. The fact is that their music is absolutely good and for me it's not yet another average sounding old school death metal release. Every song on "Rites of the Mangled" sounds brilliant, every song is filled with riffs that are GODLY and the whole music fills me with aggression and energy that erupt from it. I absolutely recommend it. 

Standout tracks: "Burn the Entrails", "Banished to Oblivion", "Incantation" 

Final rate: 85/10