MindCrime Reviews #7: Torment - Six Feet Under

If you want to go read something else, I really don’t blame you. Because, this review is not going to pleasant.

The first six reviews in this series...wait. Six Feet Under. I’m reviewing a Six Feet Under album after my sixth album review, and one half of all of the songs on this album is six. That’s 666. Maybe it’s not just Iron Maiden...
Anyway, the first six were basically in preparation for this album. I had to listen to things that aren’t as bad as this before listening to this awful album.

Let’s begin with the album art, The very first thing you see going into an album. What even is this? I can’t even make something up to describe this. It looks like Gollum fused with a feral ghoul from Fallout and then stumbled into Ed Gein’s house. It looks like it’s made from really bad CGI as well. It’s worse than the album cover of Dance Of Death by Iron Maiden, and that cover is completely god awful. Perfect metaphor going into one of the biggest piles of garbage I’ve ever heard in my life.

1. Sacrificial Kill
Doesn’t start off too bad. Has a good riff at first and some decent drumming with a nice groove. Then the vocals start. Oh my god...what the hell? It sounds like Cookie Monster with a vocal hemorrhage tried to make an extreme metal record. If it wasn’t for Chris Barnes’ awful vocals and horrendous songwriting, plus his arrogance, they’d be a much better band. Those three things alone ruin this entire band. But there’s even more. They don’t even try! Well, by quote-unquote “they”, I mean Chris Barnes. This dude doesn’t even try to be a decent songwriter, and he could probably sing with some decent clean vocals. But he doesn’t. He just lazily belts out these awful growls that sound like a constipated moose with a human brain trying to sing. The instrumentalists try, at least. I’d like this band if it wasn’t for Chris Barnes. Past all of that, the song is really just a bland piece of extreme metal garbage. The music may be bland, but it’s decent at least. Everything else...I’ve got nothing. 1/10

2. Exploratory Homicide
All of the same problems that Sacrificial Kill has still apply here, but it’s worse. The music goes absolutely horribly with the vocals. It sounds like Dukes era Exodus, but watered down with a terrible excuse for death growling instead of decent vocal performances. Except for the drum fills, the drumming just feels lifeless. The guitar work and bass is decent, but this is the absolute epitome of mediocrity. I’ve never heard more boring music in my life. 1/10

3. The Separation Of Flesh From Bone
The intro is horrendous. It’s a bunch of random growls that sound like a dying animal! For real, that’s what it sounds like! Maybe if the vocals were screamed instead of growled, they could be at least semi decent. But, no. He has to put absolutely no effort into it whatsoever. The riff is just empty, like Exploratory Homicide. It just feels like it was written synchronized to the awful vocals. Oh, wait, it was. That’s all this album is. It’s just lifeless, trash death metal built around this guy’s completely reprehensible vocals and bland, needlessly violent lyrics with no purpose other than to appear scary and to shock you. With Cannibal Corpse, they’re telling horror stories in the form of death metal. It’s just too extreme for its own good a lot of the time. Think that, but worse and without any of the effort. My god, this is awful. Not quite as bad as the last two, but that really isn’t saying much at all. 2/10

4. Schizomania
This one has all of the traits of the last three, but on top of all of that, it’s extraordinarily repetitive. Oh, there’s another thing to address. This is one of the most repetitive albums I’ve ever listened to. Everything sounds exactly the same with slight variations. Reign In Blood by Slayer is more diverse than this, and I’ve already talked ad nauseum about how unvaried and bland that album is. This is basically a puréed version of that album that’s been lit on fire after being puréed. At least Reign In Blood had some redeemable qualities in it. This piece of trash is just soulless and, ironically, torment to sit through. 1/10

5. Skeleton
It doesn’t start off awful. It’s got a decent drum rythym and some good riffing. But then the vocals start. Oh my god. What was he thinking? This band should not exist. I wish he’d just gotten a job as a store clerk or something instead of forming this terrible band. All of the songs are very clearly based around Chris Barne’s vocals, which is why they feel so lifeless. They (the instrumentalists) don’t get a chance to truly show what they’re capable of because of this dude with an ego bigger than the amount of talent he has. I detest this band, and this is just another abomination of a song on an abomination of an album. 0/10

6. Knife Through The Skull
Has a pretty good riff, and some great drums and bass to go along with it. The vocals, however...I wish Chris Barnes had just learned to play an instrument and gotten another vocalist instead. All this band does is pump out generic death metal garbage and that’s it. Cannibal Corpse makes horror movies in music form. Six Feet Under makes diarrhea in music form. That’s what this is: musical diarrhea. It’s just a bunch of random riffs thrown together to go along with his awful voice. It sounds like Meshuggah and every doom metal band, in a bad way. 2/10

7. Slaughtered as They Slept
The first time I heard this, the song switched from Knfe Through The Skull to this, and I didn’t even notice it until a minute and a half through the song, because this album is that repetitive. Sounds like awful death metal mixed with djent and doom metal. But the results are terrible. This sounds like absolute crap, whoever said this was a good idea should be fired. It’s a shame these talented musicians waste their time on garbage like this. I absolutely love the riff at 1:06, and if it was used properly, this could’ve been something good. But no. This album is a cesspool of wasted potential. What could’ve been isn’t. What shouldn’t have been is. 3/10

8. In The Process Of Decomposing
Oh, hey, another song that sounds exactly like the last one! I’m so surprised! This is honestly starting to get rage inducing because of how bad it is. This is literally a chore to get through. You know what? This album is decomposing. It just gets worse and worse as it goes from track 6 on. The last two songs on here are the absolute worst. Apart from that, this song is just more of the same. I can’t even describe it at this point. I’ve run out of things to say. 0/10

9. Funeral Mask
There’s 12 songs worth of this. 46 minutes of this load of garbage. How am I supposed to keep describing this? It speaks for itself, all of it is practically a carbon copy of the last song, but worse. It sounds like something from Persistence Of Time by Anthrax if it was terrible. Or Train Of Thought by Dream Theater. This is some of the worst metal I’ve ever heard in my life. Chris Barnes was a good death growler back in the 90’s with Cannibal Corpse, but now he’s not. I’ve never heard another vocalist that got this progressively bad over time. He’s the Lars Ulrich of metal vocals, but worse at singing than Lars is at drumming. At least Lars is still good in the studio. 0/10

10. Obsidian
This is basically just watered down Cannibal Corpse, right here. I can barely understand what Chris is saying because of his unintelligible growling that sounds like a cow belching. There’s not even a guitar solo on these songs that I heard to break up how monotonous this is! It’s more repetitive than Lulu by Metallica and Lou Reed! I’d rather hear Lou Reed’s talking vocals over this trash any day. 0/10

11. Bloody Underwear
Oh my god! What!? There’s some awful stuff on this album, but this is embarrassing. Who writes a song like this? Cannibal Corpse is brutal and violent, but this isn’t even violent! This is just edgy and not in a good way by any means. It’s literally trying so hard to be shocking that it’s not even funny. It’s just awful. 0/10

12. Roots Of Evil
Okay, at least George Fisher from CC is a good growler and a cool person. Chris Barnes is neither of those things. He should’ve never made this band. This is awful. This was torture to sit through. My god does it go out on a bad note with one of the worst songs I’ve ever heard in my life. 0/10

Overall score: 12/100

That’s how bad this is. It scored less than 20/100. I’m sure I’ll hear worse, but this is awful.

Comments

The album is the opposite of the review. The album is bad, the review is amazing! - visitor (3/21/2018)

Thank you, but when did you listen to this album? Not doubting you did, but this really doesn’t seem like the kind of thing you’d listen to at any point in time, lol. - visitor (3/21/2018)

My mom loves it. She always plays it in the car. - visitor (3/21/2018)

Why do I find that so difficult to believe? - visitor (3/21/2018)

I don’t know. - visitor (3/21/2018)

I don’t either. *Unfitting ominous keyboard solo* - visitor (3/21/2018)