Customer Reviews

From Enslavement to Obliteration

5 star:		(20)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

I first bought this tape in 1988, when the most extreme thing myself or any of my friends were listening to was Dark Angel, Slayer or Ludichrist. Napalm Death opened a Pandora's box to to a whole new realm of speed with "Enslavement", a step up from the noise-heavy but still classic "Scum". They take a more metal direction with Bill Steer just starting to find his sound before moving on to Carcass after this album. Mick Harris drums like a controlled spaz in this one, accelerating the blender to dizzying speeds and Lee Dorrain, spewing out a caustic growl far removed from his doom/stoner efforts in Cathedral, lets you feel his pain with every strained yell and undecipherable lyric. Truly a work of art and a great intro to the fine art of grindcore, along with "Scum" and "Reek of Putrefaction" by Carcass. Experience the classic ND lineup at it's most hectic. . . .

I notice a great deal of people complain about the lack of melody, harmony ect. Bear in mind, however that Grindcore, the genre of which Napalm Death are one of the major innovators is an entirely different animal than most. If you think everything should be in perfect unison and synchronicity, listen to Rush or something. Not knocking Geddy and the boys, just stating that this is different music with different goals than most (at the time it was, anyway). For the most part, Grindcore has a few bands that did something interesting with it, and a bunch of second rate clone bands. Napalm Death, along with Carcass, Terrorizer, Brutal Truth and Extreme Noise Terror are some of the more notable exceptions. The reason most people dislike these bands is that Grind is deliberately unsynchronized and off time. Also amazingly abrasive, sometimes to a greater degree than Black Metal and without the atmosphere. The lyrics on this cd are some of the most intelligent Metal lyrics I've ever read. Forget socially conscious, this is flat out Protest rock. The lyrics are essential to read as otherwise the vocals of Lee Dorian are completely indecipherable, although not without visceral entertainment value. I love this album, it makes me violently thrash about to lightning fast riffs, and actually use my brain at the same time. One major recurring theme is an intensely anti-mysogynist attitude and quite a few other ideas which one would not expect on one of the most extreme Metal albums ever. Mick Harris's drumming never fails to drop my jaw with the utter ferocity he exhibits. Production is fairly gruesome, but if you're listening to stuff like Napalm Death the odds are you won't be the slightest bit bothered by it. Raw, intelligent and totally necessary.

I got this when it came out back in '88 and it totally changed my musical perspective. I'd already heard Scum and the Peel Sessions 12", but this album took legendary Brummie noise merchants Napalm Death to a whole new level of deranged, superfast grindcore mayhem!!! This is probably as extreme as Napalm got, and, if you approach with an open mind, much noisy fun can be had. The lyrics are also excellent, something which too often gets overlooked when talking about this band. If you're a curious metal/punk fan looking for your first dose of Napalm, Scum or the new album, Enemy Of The Music Business, are probably better places to start, but if you're a committed noise/grindcore fan, you must own this album - so stop messing about and add it to your cart! The ultimate grindcore record. CHUFFED!!!

Oh man. I'll never forget when I was looking for this new extreme band they were talking about in the radio. I went to the record shop and asked the guy if he'd know something about it because I forgot the name. He gave me the right record ! I listened to one or two songs and was floored. I never heard something like this before.
At home, my buddy and I listened to this thing in full effect and we laughed our asses off ! We were almost rolling on the floor. We laughed because it was so crazy, brutal and extreme. But then it got serious; we were simply totally astonished.
The production blew me away. To this day, I've never heard such ferocious drumming. The bass is ultra-brutal and deep. The lovely Bill Steer (who moved on to the also great Carcass later on and is now singing and playing in Firebird, great band by the way) builds a wall of sound with his guitar. And of course the wonderful Lee Dorrian, now leader of Cathedral, who seemed to be tortured during recording. He growls, cries, shouts like all the pain and injustice in this world goes thru him. The lyrics are intelligent and political.
Or like a German rock critic once wrote: This represents the last lethal puking into the big cosmic toilet we all have to pass by one day (hope you understand my weak English translation).
This record is a special classic.
Every home needs one.

There is a lot of criticism by the "new school" Napalm Death fans out there. Sure, Napalm Death was a great 90's death metal band, but everything from "Harmony Corruption" through their nowadays records are simply death metal. But "Scum" and "FETO" are grindcore. Grindcore does not equal death metal...and everyone should know why. Fans of the newer Napalm Death should not take their first two albums as death metal. As for Napalm Death themselves, they revolutionalized grindcore, tagged it and released two of the best grind albums in 1987 and '89. "FETO" is not "Scum", but it is better than (most) of the thousand clones that came out after grindcore became a important genre of music. In my opinion, the 1989 lineup was the best lineup ever in the band's history. Led by Bill Steer on guitars (also of Carcass fame), Lee Dorrian (also of Cathedral fame), Shane Embury on bass and Mick Harris, who went on to many industrial and doom metal projects, these legendary musicians were able to grind out this 34:18, 27-song album.

Production for this album is *better* than "Scum", and everything (except the bass) is audible, but it isn't perfect. But, for a grindcore album, it is good. Lyrics...the lyrics are pure genius. Inspired by old-school punk and the "f*** it all" attitude, you get some very angry lyrics. Songs like "It's A M.A.N.S.'s World" and "Evolved As One" offer some of the best political lyrics out there. Lee Dorrian combines the low, inaudible grunts and the high pitched shriek for vocals, which may scare away little kids, but if you try to sing behind all that carnage, it would sound stupid. Mick Harris fills drum duties perfectly, grinding out some fast and crazy stuff. The bass is inaudible, which is no surprise. And Bill Steer...this man gets my respect just for starting Carcass, but he helped revolutionize two musical genre's (grind with Napalm and Carcass and melo-death with Carcass). He is a great songwriter, and shows it in every band he is in. The guitars are on steroids and play at an insanely fast pace. You should all bow down to Mr. Steer and treat him as a god!

This 28-track album kicks off with "Evolved As One", which sounds like more of an industrial song, with a cool drum fill and almost talking vocals until Dorrian busts out screaming "weak minds" until the end. Then, the carnage begins. Most of the songs are a minute long. There are some longer songs, which slow down a little bit. These slower songs are awesome...period. Toward the end of the album, there are some 0:05 and 0:06 second songs that are there for filler, but like the immortal "You Suffer" on "Scum', they have music, lyrics and vocals, and are oddly considered real "songs". The best songs here include "Evolved as One", "It's a M.A.N.S World!" (with great, sarcastic yet serious lyrics), "Unchallenged Hate", "Display to Me...", "From Enslavement to Obliteration" and "Mentally Murdered". Sometimes, you could hear a compressed guitar solo in some of the songs. Very cool. As the title of this review states, this is one of the best grindcore albums ever. I have had this album for a long, long time, and it hasn't left my CD player in that length of time. Essential for any extreme metal fan out there. Compared to Napalm Death's followers, nothing comes close (except...maybe Carcass or Nasum). Go out and get this album if you consider yourself an extreme metal fan.

This album is pretty intense. I listened to it once in the car with a friend who wasn't into heavy music, and his head exploded. All the songs after the first are extremely fast, short, and furious as hell. This is what grindcore is all about, and this is a classic in this genre. I'd strongly recommend this if you're into metal/hardcore. But if you're new to this kind of music I'd steer clear of this one for a while. You probably wouldn't be able to appreciate it yet and your head might explode. Have fun with this one kiddies.

I think it's high time I finally gave the other side of the coin to my Scum review from a while back.

In the mid-80s, fast music was my reason for living. I started with hardcore bands like Black Flag and MDC, and went from there. I didn't care if it was punk or metal, as long as it was fast. By 1986, I was sure that nobody would ever surpass the Neos, DRI, or Slayer. One day in a record shop I was looking through the new releases, and I came across an album entitled "Scum" with a sticker on the cover that read something like "NAPALM DEATH'S DEBUT - THE FASTEST BAND EVER. PERIOD." Naturally I bought it without a second thought and assumed it would instantly become one of my favorite albums. I couldn't have been more wrong. The recording quality sounded poor, as did the musicianship. It sounded like they were trying to play material that was beyond their abilities. It was undeniably the fastest music I'd heard up to that point, but there was no power behind it. It had all the force of a hummingbird beating its wings. Not my idea of an impressive debut. I hated it. A few months later, it seemed like all of my fellow speed mongers were in love with Napalm Death. I wanted nothing to do with them, or any other grindcore band. It's true what they say about first impressions.

My distaste for grindcore lasted a long time. I was occasionally exposed to the stuff through friends and the other writers at the fanzine I was affiliated with back then, but I just tuned it out. Naturally I was particularly averse to Napalm Death, so I did everything in my power to make sure my ears were never assaulted by them. Around 1992 I became friends with a guy who had extremely similar tastes to me, but he loved Napalm Death. One day I was talking about how I hated them, and at some point he said something like "You don't hate Napalm Death, you just hate their first album. Check out their second album." He took out his copy of From Enslavement to Obliteration and put it on the turntable. That was when I turned around. This album impressed me immediately, and I couldn't believe it was the same band that recorded Scum. (Well, technically, it wasn't... Mick Harris was the only remaining member from Scum, and Bill Steer who only played on one side of it.) The performance and the production are both brutally top notch. This album is what finally opened me up to grindcore, at least a little. It's never been my favorite genre, but I do enjoy it every now and then. As far as I'm concerned, this album has never been surpassed. To this day, it represents to me Napalm Death at their peak and the pinnacle of the genre in general. Most of my CDs get packed away and go unheard for years at a time, but FEtO is one of the few that's always kept within arm's reach so I can get at it whenever the urge strikes me.

Napalm death is my favorite grindcore band of all time. From enslavement to obliteration is by far the best album out there for grindcore. The album is so fast and heavy and drums does not end. Lee dorrian did very well on singing on this recording as well as half of the scum album.

The grindcore movement apogee. Probably one of the most extreme albums ever. When I first heard it back in '89, I was completely floored. Extreme purity of sound. Unmatched speed. The highlight is the transition from the slow intro-like "Evolved as One" to the shriek of "It's a M.A.N.S. world". The noise explodes and never lets up until you slump into exhaustion around the fourth track. This is the problem with this kind of music. It's hard to mosh to for more than ten second. So its uses are limited. Still, the best ever. Get it and go deaf.

This album steamrolls through its twenty-plus tracks with relentless power and angst. Where the debut, Scum, summons feelings of despair, From Enslavement leans more toward anger. It has more of a "screw-you" feeling than Scum's "we're all screwed" tone. The songs average about a minute apiece, and are so fast there's no opportunity to catch a breath. Several have become live staples, like Lucid Fairytale, Unchallenged Hate, the title track, and the five-second Dead. Out of the others, I'd like to see Cock-Rock Alienation and Display to Me played live, as they'd both fit in well with the band's current sound. Some of the riffs on this album are catchier than Scum, but the extremity is retained, you might say. Be warned, though; like Scum, pure grindcore like this is not for the uninitiated, and if you're only a fan of more recent Napalm albums, you might not even like this. Even though you can hear traces of their later sound in the guitar tone and hardcore-inspired breakdowns, it's a different style of music. But if you listen to it a few times and try to understand it, it will eventually blow you away. Blindingly fast, grinding riffs, whirlwind hyper-speed drums, infrequently enunciated barking death vocals mixed with utterly insane, nearly unintelligible screaming...crazy stuff. From Enslavement is beyond heavy, and is the very definition of extreme.