Pathology has been creating brutal music on a consistent basis for the past 10 years or so. Their newest self-titled release will be their 9th full-length release. For those not familiar with Pathology, they remain one of the more consistent brutal death metal acts of this decade. From each release comes a new focus of rhythmic brutal death metal, always characterized by Matti Way's phlegmy gutturals, and Dave Aster conducting the remarkable beats from behind the drums.
Pathology's self-titled release comes after a delay in a time where they were averaging one release a year. This self-titled arrived two years after their last offering. The anticipation is worth the wait, but the advances in their music style has me wondering slightly. It is difficult to not take previous releases into account when observing new music and judging it on its own, but recognizing the direction it takes is part of the experience.
With this self-titled, there is a large focus on the slam aspect, as almost all the lyrical patterns performed by the vocalist Matti Way have this rhythmic flow. Yes, this tends to be more of his style in his vocal approach, but this album seems to embrace this more than I have heard from his other works. He makes it work, but the direction of a more slam-centered approach in general had me longing for a more technical, riff transitioning, mind bending brutal death theme that Pathology is well known for. In all fairness, this newer direction is not terrible, it simply takes some getting used to, and seeing so many new slam bands already perform this type of music lessens the impact I was hoping this record would have in 2017.
Not a bad release by any means, I just hope that if Pathology takes another break in writing that their release would be slightly more unique, and more "Pathology" of old.
Score: 6.5/10
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2OH3ZiGRCnY[/youtube]
