{"id":24698,"date":"2015-04-30T13:00:56","date_gmt":"2015-04-30T18:00:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.toiletovhell.com\/?p=24698"},"modified":"2015-04-30T13:33:36","modified_gmt":"2015-04-30T18:33:36","slug":"justify-your-unflushed-shit-morbid-angels-illud-divinum-insanus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/justify-your-unflushed-shit-morbid-angels-illud-divinum-insanus\/","title":{"rendered":"Justify Your Unflushed Shit: Morbid Angel&#8217;s Illud Divinum Insanus"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"fb-root\"><\/div>\n<p>Journal of extreme record, Decibel Magazine, previously featured a highly entertaining column entitled <a href=\"http:\/\/decibelmagazine.com\/search?q=Justify%20Your%20Shitty%20Taste\" target=\"_blank\">Justify Your Shitty Taste<\/a>, in which a staff writer would defend a notorious album that was badly received by critics and fans upon release and, with a few notable exceptions, generally hasn\u2019t had its reputation rehabilitated since. No prizes for guessing that <em>St. Anger<\/em> was one of the featured records. Or <em>Cold Lake<\/em>. Or <em>Diabolus in Musica<\/em>. Or <em>Turbo<\/em> and <em>Swansong<\/em> \u2013 though they are probably the most prominent examples of records that have been exonerated by history.<\/p>\n<p>Sadly the series ceased \u00a0\u2013 maybe the bad releases by established bands just got <em>so<\/em> sucky, no hack could find merit in them even after smoking an entire greenhouse of cannabis and being bribed by the record label.<\/p>\n<p>But I propose that we in the Toilet ov Hell revive Decibel\u2019s tradition of devil\u2019s advocate polemics. For potential copyright-infringement concerns we\u2019ll alter the title of our series, but the spirit and ritual remain: One of us delivers an impassioned and logical rant about why a much-maligned record is actually brilliant or at least not as bad as everybody else claimed before flushing. Then, in the comments section, everybody else tells the writer s\/he\u2019s a deranged fuckwit with stupefying taste and possibly a wallet full of record label payola.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>In the time the Toilet\u2019s been on the grid, I\u2019ve noticed that my thoughts seem to be quite respected around here. It is sincerely gratifying. But today, let\u2019s put an unceremonious end to that as I inaugurate Justify Your Unflushed Shit by feebly suggesting that metalheads everywhere give a second chance to <strong>Morbid Angel\u2019s<\/strong> 2011 disasterpiece,<em> Illud Divinum Insanus.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>I.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\"  style=\"display: block; margin: 0px auto;\"  id=\"_ytid_70604\"  width=\"320\" height=\"240\"  data-origwidth=\"320\" data-origheight=\"240\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/8HQGqV1Ho4k?enablejsapi=1&#038;autoplay=0&#038;cc_load_policy=0&#038;cc_lang_pref=&#038;iv_load_policy=1&#038;loop=0&#038;modestbranding=0&#038;rel=1&#038;fs=1&#038;playsinline=1&#038;autohide=2&#038;theme=dark&#038;color=red&#038;controls=1&#038;\" class=\"__youtube_prefs__  epyt-is-override  no-lazyload\" title=\"YouTube player\"  allow=\"fullscreen; accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen data-no-lazy=\"1\" data-skipgform_ajax_framebjll=\"\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Devastatingly bad reviews are always a lot more fun to read than effusively good ones, and \u201cdevastatingly bad\u201d are almost the only sort I could find from the time of <em>Illud Divinum Insanus\u2019<\/em>s release. I\u2019d not anticipated how much fun doing the research for this article was going to be.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\u201c\u2019Illud Divinum Insanus\u2019 is meant to be extreme music for extreme people, but unfortunately I&#8217;m sat at a desk with a mug of tea in a comfortably lit room, and I&#8217;m not feeling particularly extreme; nowhere around are there ravaged animal carcasses, semi-conscious hookers or paintings on linen canvas, sketched out with sky blue Crayola and detailed with my own faeces. Maybe it&#8217;s not for me, then, but let&#8217;s face it &#8211; it&#8217;s probably not for you, either.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>&#8211; Duncan Geddes, <a href=\"http:\/\/-\thttp:\/\/www.ultimate-guitar.com\/reviews\/compact_discs\/morbid_angel\/illud_divinum_insanus\">www.ultimate-guitar.com<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<blockquote><p>\u00a0\u201c &#8216;Radikult&#8217; is simply..\u2026 bad butt rock that manages to be every bit as banal as commercially driven hard rock usually is. &#8220;Radikult&#8221; also manages to go on for far too long, making it fail at everything that it attempts to do. It&#8217;s too mainstream to please the band&#8217;s fans, while the rest of the album won&#8217;t appeal to mainstream listeners\u2026.a song that, if remembered at all, will be remembered for appealing to nobody.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>&#8211; Dasher10, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.metalunderground.com\/reviews\/details.cfm?releaseid=4847\">www.metalunderground.com<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<blockquote><p>\u00a0\u201cIt wouldn\u2019t surprise me if Trey never turned over the demos to Season Of Mist. Or perhaps the label, thrilled to have signed the highest-priority act in death metal today&#8230;.had no real idea what atrocity was about to transpire. Morbid Angel has all but abandoned everything that made them the top-tier performers they once were, striking down their death metal aesthetic in favor of an outdated, lazy techno\/industrial vibe that sounds hilariously out of place\u2026 Something has gone terribly wrong here, and it is utterly baffling that this was allowed to happen.<\/p>\n<p>We couldn\u2019t even team up on this with opposing views, because there are no opposing views anywhere on our staff.<\/p>\n<p>&#8230;.entitling a song \u201cToo Extreme!\u201d only serves to call attention to the fact that there is nothing extreme, interesting, or in any way laudable about it. Additionally, calling the outro to your shit-fest of an album \u201cMea Culpa\u201d (the Latinate equivalent of \u201cMy bad\u201d) seems to go beyond a palatable level of wink-and-nudge critic-baiting, and instead approaches the level of reckless self-harm that typically requires civil commitment&#8230;.the intermittent telephone rings that Season Of Mist inserted throughout the promo download of this album actually improve upon what has been recorded.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>&#8211; Jim Brandon and Dan Obstkreig, <a href=\"http:\/\/lastrit.es\/reviews\/6246\/morbid-angel-illud-divinum-insanus#sthash.9rNvNNOK.dpuf\">Lastrites.<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Okay, I think you get the idea. Now my turn.<\/p>\n<p>II.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s very difficult for me to criticize <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong>, no matter how bad they artistically misfire. Because the truth is, they habitually have. Even they admit that they took two attempts at getting their debut album recorded, and now regard the first attempt in 1986 as a non-canonical bootleg. It took me many years to figure out which <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> album I liked best, because to me, they all have some less-than-stellar songs. It\u2019s a bit difficult to grant an album All-Killer-No-Filler status when perhaps 30% of the setlist is done on keyboards after a 10-hour Quake marathon. (I finally settled on <em>Covenant<\/em>, which seems to be a safe choice at this point in history.) At any rate, when some of the other material on your albums ranks as possibly the only example in metal which sounds like it actually <em>was<\/em> written and performed by Lovecraftian demons instead of 20-something humans &#8211; which literally <em>does<\/em> sound insanely inspired by dark possession \u2013 I absolutely think you\u2019ve earned the moral capital to get it wrong sometimes.<\/p>\n<p>My point is &#8211; a <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> album where a lot of the material makes you raise your eyebrow incredulously was not a new experience for me by the time I heard <em>Illud Divinum Insanus<\/em>. But here\u2019s where I get more contentious: Examined carefully, there is absolutely <em>nothing<\/em> on <em>Illud Divinum Insanus<\/em> which is without precedent in <strong>Morbid Angel\u2019s<\/strong> artistic remit. Nothing. It is NOT a sell-out. For anybody who understands this, the worst that can be claimed is that the band just happened to emphasize the aspects nobody really prefers, but which were either kept on a tolerably tight leash throughout previous excursions, or relegated to remix EPs.<\/p>\n<p>Looked at statistically and disqualifying the intro (just as you\u2019d have to do if we were examining<em> Blessed Are the Sick<\/em> or <em>Gateways to Annihilation<\/em>), the record features five out of ten songs that could be classed as \u201corthodox\u201d, <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong>-style death metal: \u201cExisto Vulgore,\u201d \u201cBlades for Baal,\u201d \u201c10 More Dead,\u201d \u201cNevermore,\u201d and \u201cBeauty Meets Beast.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Of those, \u201cExisto Vulgore\u201d and \u201cNevermore\u201d are perfectly serviceable <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> numbers that I can get behind. Moreover \u201cBlades For Baal\u201d is the standout of the orthodox tracks and one which I knew, from the first time I heard it, was destined for the Greatest Morbid Hits playlist on my i-Pod alongside the likes of \u201cChapel of Ghouls\u201d, \u201cBrainstorm\u201d, \u201cGod of Emptiness\u201d, etc. It somewhat resembles \u201cVengeance Is Mine\u201d \u2013 another personal favourite \u2013 but also features a very nicely-executed breakdown and solo.<\/p>\n<p>I\u2019m also partial to \u201c10 More Dead.\u201d At the time, this track came under hive-mind fire for apparently sounding too \u201cnu-metal.\u201d I\u2019m sorry, but equating that song to the output of <strong>Korn<\/strong> or <strong>Soulfly<\/strong>, as many did, is just asinine. For one thing, it\u2019d have to be the first nu-metal song I\u2019ve ever heard with a skank-and-blast middle section. (It\u2019s quite funny to designate, as a nu-metal song, a composition that 99.9% of nu-metal bands would thereby be incapable of performing. Look, here\u2019s a fun exercise: Some weeks ago, here at the TovH, we featured a nu-metal theme for Riff ov the Week. So I guess what you\u2019re saying is that, had I entered the competition, I could have used one of the riffs from this song? Anybody care to tell me which one?)<\/p>\n<p>The main rationale for such a categorization appeared to be that <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> used a lower-than-usual tuning, probably on a different guitar \u2013 like an Ibanez Universe 7-string. That, you\u2019ll remember, was the axe of choice for the nu-metallers; hence the categorization. The only problem is &#8211; that as anyone who got <em>Covenant<\/em> when it first came out will remember &#8211; <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> were employing 7-string guitars when the nu-metal genre was still in diapers. You\u2019re putting cart before horse.<\/p>\n<p>At this point it needs to be established: Contrary to conventional wisdom, <em>Illud Divinum Insanus<\/em> is, at the very least, a 50 percent death metal album and 100% a <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> album. Anybody who ranks it as an artistic misfire on the level of <em>Cold Lake<\/em> or, say, <em>Lulu<\/em>, is patently incorrect. The only way it could be that is if <em>Lulu<\/em> featured a token bunch of songs which sounded like they came from <em>Master of Puppets<\/em> and <strong>Lou Reed<\/strong> wasn\u2019t singing on them.<\/p>\n<p>III.<\/p>\n<p>Now let\u2019s deal with the other five decidedly <em>unorthodox<\/em> songs. Two fall into a category of being songs that resemble <strong>Laibach<\/strong> remixes of themselves: \u201cToo Extreme!\u201d and \u201cDestructos vs. The Earth.\u201d In other words, if they\u2019d gotten Tim Yeung to provide the kick and snare for those songs instead of just the cymbals &#8211; perhaps in some busier or more brutal patterns than what was programmed &#8211; and omitted some of the electro bells and whistles, they\u2019d more closely resemble \u201corthodox\u201d death metal \u2013 of sorts.<\/p>\n<p>That leaves us with \u201cI Am Morbid,\u201d the infamously derided \u201cRadikult,\u201d and \u201cProfundis-Mea Culpa.\u201d Of those three, \u201cI Am Morbid,\u201d oft dismissed as a hideous attempt at stadium rock, isn\u2019t <em>that<\/em> extraordinary if you consider some of the band\u2019s earlier excursions into outright groove like \u201cWhere the Slime Live.\u201d \u201cProfundis-Mea Culpa\u201d \u2013 besides being somewhat a reprise of the first two tracks \u2013 bears slight resemblance to another song from the same 1995 album; namely \u201cHatework\u201d \u2013 a self-consciously experimental closer which everybody seemed to like in those days.<\/p>\n<p>(I\u2019ll go out on a limb and say that stylistically, the whole record picks up where <em>Domination<\/em> left off. Had David Vincent remained in the band all those years, it\u2019s possible we would have gotten a record like <em>Illud Divinum Insanus<\/em> much sooner. The difference is that back then, the \u201cindustrial experimentation\u201d singled out for the most criticism on account of sounding so \u201cdated\u201d wouldn\u2019t have been dated at all \u2013 instead, the band would have been accused of bandwagon-jumping. Which they would have been, but whatever.)<\/p>\n<p>No band ever deserves to be lauded just for the sake of experimentation itself. That\u2019s the main criticism that is made of <em>Illud Divinum Insanus<\/em>, and let me state now that I think it\u2019s a totally legitimate one. In fact, I agree with it \u2013 <em>Illud Divinum Insanus<\/em> does not strike me as a particularly \u201ccutting-edge\u201d album by 2011 extreme metal standards; and I too would have preferred a higher ratio of orthodox death metal. But orthodox death metal itself does not guarantee merit. After all, <em>Heretic<\/em> has the highest concentration of orthodox death metal <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> have ever offered since <em>Altars of Madness<\/em> \u2013 and it holds the distinction of being the most unmemorable <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> album I own. I own all of them, and <em>Heretic<\/em> is the only one I haven\u2019t listened to in the many years since I got it.<\/p>\n<p>Plenty pointed out that in 2011, there was nothing \u201cextreme\u201d or \u201ccutting-edge\u201d about crossing over to low-tier industrial rock &#8211; like <strong>Rammstein, Marilyn Manson<\/strong>, or<strong> White Zombie<\/strong>\u00a0&#8211; from about fifteen years prior. For me personally, though, that was always a moot point. Any self-respecting <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> fan in the late \u201890s was paying as little attention as possible to mall-rat abominations like those acts anyway \u2013 so even in 2011, what <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> were doing kinda <em>was<\/em> fresh and \u201cnew\u201d by default, at least to me.<\/p>\n<p>But I concede that\u2019s a strawman argument. More honestly I have to address a deeper concern fans have about a band losing its stylistic identity \u2013 people who have been fans of <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> just as long as I have and who have invested just as much of their own identity into it all. Doing this recalls my observation about the band sounding like a bunch of Lovecraftian demons. With their inhuman percussive battery, twisted riffs, tortured solos and all-round dragged-from-another-dimension vibe, topped off with Vincent\u2019s classic <a href=\"http:\/\/www.invisibleoranges.com\/2013\/11\/death-metal-english\/\">Death Metal English<\/a> lyricism, <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> certainly achieved that in a way that many other peers curiously didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n<p>For listeners who get off on that trademark demonic vibe, it can be a little disconcerting when <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> break character and seem merely \u201chuman\u201d. They\u2019ve done that occasionally in the past \u2013 there were hints of it on <em>Domination<\/em>; and as much as I enjoy Pete Sandoval under the microscope on <em>Heretic<\/em> with \u201cDrum Check\u201d, I have to admit that putting a drum solo on a <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> record that is introduced by a studio engineer directing Pete to hit his kick drum is really quite out of context. Any spoken words on a <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> record should be ritual incantations, not sound-checks. You may as well have <strong>Nile<\/strong> write a song about hot-rods that starts out with engine-revving noises.<\/p>\n<p>Well, <em>Illud Divinum Insanus<\/em> is full of disconcerting, all-too-of-this-world moments like that. Again, they mightn\u2019t be without precedent, but that doesn\u2019t mean they\u2019re necessarily welcome. The lighters\/smartphones-ahoy call-and-response of \u201cI Am Morbid,\u201d the news broadcast in \u201cDestructos vs. The Earth\u201d, the whole fucking concept of \u201cRadikult\u201d with its Yee-hah! vocal stylings \u2013 don\u2019t worry, I\u2019m not even going to try and defend that song. If I was a Season of Mist executive, it\u2019s the one track I would have insisted they omit. (Although to the \u201c<strong>Bodycount<\/strong> called; they want their lyrics back\u201d brigade I must point out: It\u2019s \u201cKiller Cult\u201d you dicks, not \u201cKill a cop.\u201d Granted, that\u2019s not to suggest it\u2019s any better a line; nor to deny the liner notes should\u2019ve included a lyric sheet to avoid confusion.)<\/p>\n<p>Indeed, the overall lack of Death Metal English on the album in favour of repetitive sloganeering, gang vocals and so forth is somewhat off-putting. It <em>sounds<\/em> like David Vincent, but it doesn\u2019t<em> play<\/em> like him. That said, for me,\u201cI Am Morbid\u201d is a nice change of pace from the preceding blasters even if it is a stark example of the \u201ctoo human\u201d Morbid Angel; so I can get behind that, too. And here\u2019s the shocker: I <em>love<\/em> \u201cDestructos vs. The Earth.\u201d Disco rhythms, high-pitched backing vocals and all. To me it\u2019s not only catchy \u2013 there\u2019s something remarkably <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> about it for such an unconventional approach. I can\u2019t effectively explain why, but it\u2019s my favourite track on the album. It would be easy to explain that the song is saved by Azagthoth\u2019s characteristic and singular guitar-playing \u2013 an element that was begrudgingly listed as one of few redeeming features across pretty much the whole album by critics trying to find <em>something<\/em> nice to say \u2013 but for me it goes way beyond that. I don\u2019t like the song in spite of itself; I actually like it; as in &#8211; I would gladly cover it in a <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> tribute band.<\/p>\n<p>IV.<\/p>\n<p>Before concluding, let me address a few other criticisms that I remember dominating reviews and comment threads in 2011:<\/p>\n<p>1) \u201cIt isn\u2019t the same without Pete.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>And <em>Surgical Steel<\/em> isn\u2019t the same without Ken. In fact, <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> isn\u2019t the same without Mike Browning, Dallas Ortega or Richard Brunelle; certainly not without Erik Rutan. Hell, <strong>Napalm Death<\/strong> wasn\u2019t even the same side of the LP without Justin Broadrick. But shit happens.<\/p>\n<p>It shouldn\u2019t even need saying: People, this is heavy metal. Line-up changes aren\u2019t just inevitable, they\u2019re practically mandatory. Sure, I might be saying this as somebody whose favourite <strong>Van Halen<\/strong> album is <em>5150<\/em>; and I\u2019ll understand if you think that disqualifies my judgment. But if we go through your favourite records by your favourite bands, I\u2019ll bet we can find at least one historical example where people said, \u201cThey\u2019re never gonna pull it off without that guy\u201d and then they did. Seriously, this argument should have died out from <em>Heaven and Hell<\/em> onwards.<\/p>\n<p>2) \u201cThe drums [on the death metal songs] sound too triggered.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>This one should\u2019ve died out by now too. As I understand it, there are only two <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> albums where the kick drums <em>weren\u2019t<\/em> triggered: <em>A<\/em> (Canonical), and <em>A<\/em> (Non-Canonical). So if it\u2019s about the bass drums sounding \u201cfake\u201d, well, you\u2019ve had since 1991 to air that gripe. As for the rest of the kit, it varies over the years of their\u00a0back-catalogue. On <em>B<\/em>, the snare was triggered too \u2013 if I remember correctly from watching Tom Morris explain it on the DVD. On <em>F<\/em>, it was kicks only. On <em>G<\/em>, it sounds like snare and the toms as well, although it\u2019s amazing how much a dose of gated reverb can make real toms sound like fake ones; so you never know (There&#8217;s a LOT of albums nowadays where the drums sound like those on <em>Gateways<\/em>). I\u2019ll say this much: Apart from the kicks, the entire kit sounds a damn sight more real on <em>I<\/em> than it did on <em>G<\/em>; so I don\u2019t really know what everybody\u2019s problem is. (Note: I\u2019m NOT talking about the obviously-programmed drums on the non-orthodox material.)<\/p>\n<p>Sample-replacement of acoustic drums on records has gone from being a necessary evil in death metal to a ubiquitous industry standard in heavy metal generally. I\u2019m not in love with it; and I\u2019d prefer if \u201cgood\u201d drum sounds (a subjective matter anyway) could be achieved without resorting to triggered samples. But all I\u2019m gonna say is: If you\u2019re going to criticize the \u201cfakeness\u201d of the drums on <em>Illud Divinum Insanus<\/em>, you\u2019d better not be a fan of <strong>Pig Destroyer<\/strong> or <strong>Genghis Tron<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>3) \u201cThe vocals are too high in the mix.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>I agree. But have you heard <em>Blessed Are the Sick<\/em>\u00a0lately? Go back right now and have a listen.<\/p>\n<p>Points 2 and 3 highlight various gripes about the production; often a sore point with <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> over the years. Their albums haven\u2019t always strictly sounded like what you would expect of a premiere death metal band\u2019s records. At various times their albums have stood accused of sounding sludgy\/muddy (<em>D<\/em>), tinny (<em>C<\/em>), plastic (<em>B<\/em>), robotic (<em>G<\/em>), or sterile (<em>H<\/em>). Plenty of bands weather such criticisms, but remarkably only <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> have ever managed to collect such a variety of oft-contradictory adjectives throughout their career.<\/p>\n<p>It possibly has as much to do with the fact that unlike their peers, <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> made a point of working with different producers on nearly every outing rather than lucking out with Scott Burns or Colin Richardson and sticking with him &#8211; a brave approach resulting in a decidedly mixed bag of sonic capture. It\u2019s my personal belief that only <em>Gateways to Annihilation<\/em> has ever yielded what I imagine to be the heaving majesty of a band with <strong>Morbid Angel\u2019s<\/strong> trademark, and even that has its flaws. Tellingly, though, no <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> record has ever stopped them from sounding like <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> and that is due to one element alone: Trey Azagthoth\u2019s guitar-playing. Do you want evil? Do you want inhumanity? That\u2019s where you\u2019ll find it on any <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> record; including this one. After ten albums, beyond any doubt is the fact that you can change drummers and second guitar players; you can even change frontmen \u2013 but if you took Azagthoth out of <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong>, that\u2019s where it ends.<\/p>\n<p>V.<\/p>\n<p>Leaving the \u201cToo Human!\u201d issue aside, there\u2019s an even more telling dichotomy which I believe gets to the heart of why people found <em>Illud Divinum Insanus<\/em> so off-putting.<\/p>\n<p>The successful pop artist is one who uses different sounds to play the same song; whereas the successful rock artist uses different songs to play the same sound. That probably belies the importance of songwriting over signature sound, as far as the rock artist is concerned. Generally, an album where all ten songs have the same instrumental arrangement presented in the same type of mix (ie: most heavy metal albums) better have real strength and diversity in songwriting to maintain interest. (That or impeccable chops. Both together are ideal, though so many death metal bands settle for only the latter one.)<\/p>\n<p>But signature sound can&#8217;t be discounted in the equation, because it is the signature sound that often determines what can be gotten away with in songwriting as well as in change of genre, which is sometimes required when trying different approaches to songwriting. Successful pop artists are required to reinvent their image and sound to stay relevant; while the successful rock band has a different challenge: Maintain the signature sound and image, but use it to play different, more adventurous, and more diverse types of song. In rock, credibility is all wrapped up in the notion of <em>resisting<\/em> outside pressure to change, rather than adapting to change <em>successfully<\/em> as it is in pop.<\/p>\n<p>Rock artists are expected to change only in the sense that they explore their persona more deeply rather than being compelled to overhaul it radically. Beyond that, they are required to surpass personal musical achievements of a nature they&#8217;ve already demonstrated prowess in (writing better songs, playing guitar more extravagantly or more subtly, etc.), or, if possible, to achieve greater social relevance on their own terms. But if not capable of doing any of those things &#8211; if only capable of revealing a certain amount of their persona, if only willing to play certain types of song and unable to write better ones, if unwilling to deliver a message to anyone beyond the crowd they&#8217;ve already gotten acceptance from &#8211; they will probably still maintain their advantage provided they maintain the signature sound they&#8217;ve already established. That is exactly where the <strong>AC\/DC<\/strong>s, <strong>Motorhead<\/strong>s and <strong>Slayer<\/strong>s of the world have found themselves, and there are much worse places to be.<\/p>\n<p>By contrast, the <strong>Led Zeppelin<\/strong>s, <strong>Judas Priest<\/strong>s, <strong>Metallica<\/strong>s, <strong>Megadeth<\/strong>s, <strong>Celtic Frost<\/strong>s and even <strong>Bathory<\/strong> have taken the bigger gamble we most famously associate with the <strong>Beatles<\/strong> or <strong>U2<\/strong> \u2013 crossing genres, mastering different types of song, more persona-led development in songwriting, even trying different instrumentation and production methods. It&#8217;s a gamble that sometimes pays off, with commensurate rewards; but it can only be taken so far as it doesn\u2019t endanger credibility. <strong>Celtic Frost<\/strong> sometimes succeeded (as on <em>Into the Pandemonium<\/em>), and sometimes failed (as on <em>Cold Lake<\/em>).<\/p>\n<p><strong>Metallica&#8217;s<\/strong> &#8220;Nothing Else Matters&#8221; might be a ballad with a string section in the arrangement; but it&#8217;s a good ballad and it still sounds like <strong>Metallica<\/strong>. There is no hint (yet) of a band undergoing\u00a0identity crisis, or that they couldn&#8217;t handle the unfamiliar terrain. It simply comes across as a thrash metal act who have the confidence and skill to try something quite uncharacteristic; whereas the same band&#8217;s live album featuring orchestral accompaniment for every song was generally seen (like so many band-plus-orchestra attempts are) as a frivolous elaboration without improvement.<\/p>\n<p>In short, the popular consensus on <strong>Morbid Angel\u2019s<\/strong> gambit with<em> Illud Divinum Insanus<\/em> is failure: That a rock band attempted unsuccessfully to broaden their artistic capabilities in three ways: 1) By using their existing, organic death metal signature sound to write different types of song than usual (mainly anthems like \u201cI Am Morbid\u201d); 2) altering that signature sound with different (ie: electronic) instrumentation (as in \u201cToo Extreme!\u201d);\u00a0 or 3) doing both (as in \u201cRadikult\u201d or \u201cDestructos vs. the Earth\u201d). <em>On top of that, <\/em>4) their frontman has, through his lyrics, delivery and image, altered his persona somewhat. If you think that the new types of songwriting aren\u2019t handled well, or if you think that the alterations to the signature sound aren\u2019t interesting, or if you don\u2019t like the change in persona, then <em>Illud<\/em> is indeed a bad record. But it\u2019s my contention that with less percussion-programming and more Death Metal English, more of you would have let them get away with it.<\/p>\n<p>For me, <em>Illud Divinum Insanus<\/em> is an entirely precedented \u2013 if out of character &#8211; <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> record which features six songs I enjoy, conveniently all in one uninterrupted sequence from tracks 3 through 8. Additionally I can tolerate tracks 1 and 2; it\u2019s only from 9 onwards that the program seriously loses me. In other words, purely on the basis of how much material I find to be a compelling and unembarrassing listen, <em>Illud Divinum Insanus<\/em> mightn\u2019t be <em>Covenant<\/em> or <em>Gateways to Annihilation<\/em>. But nor is it <em>Heretic<\/em>. Possibly more for the sake of their reputation than my own comfort, I don\u2019t want another <strong>Morbid Angel<\/strong> album as divergent as <em>Illud Divinum Insanus<\/em>. But I can certainly live with and enjoy the one.<\/p>\n<p>Fire away.<\/p>\n<p><em>Photo VIA <a href=\"http:\/\/www.invisibleoranges.com\/2013\/07\/tour-morbid-angel\/\">Invisible Oranges<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Journal of extreme record, Decibel Magazine, previously featured a highly entertaining column entitled Justify Your Shitty Taste, in which a staff writer would defend a notorious album that was badly received by critics and fans upon release and, with a few notable exceptions, generally hasn\u2019t had its reputation rehabilitated since. No prizes for guessing that St. Anger was one of the featured records. Or Cold Lake. Or Diabolus in Musica. Or Turbo and Swansong \u2013 though they are probably the most prominent examples of records that have been exonerated by history. Sadly the series ceased \u00a0\u2013 maybe the bad releases [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":34,"featured_media":25976,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1310,12,403],"tags":[603,3757,954,3742,85,87],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/04\/morbid-angel1.jpg?fit=712%2C406&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24698"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/34"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24698"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24698\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25976"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24698"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24698"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/toiletovhell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24698"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}