Customer Reviews

Pierced From Within

5 star:		(63)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Out of the other albums by the guys from suffocation? I find "pierced from within" their most brutal,well produced, and, meaner lirycs untill this day. All the songs are flawless and it seems like they got heavier with each track. If i could pick a favorite track? It would've to be "invoking" check out the drums on the song...Sick dude!! Highly recommended.

This is my all time favorite death metal album. Ever. And as we speak now I am utilizing every resource I have to get more good dm as I always have. Nothing comes close to this.. Not Legion by Deicide, not Bleeding By Cannibal Corpse.. not one of the great Cryptopsy or Dying Fetus albums come close... there is a band called Decapitated that has a ... 'similar sound' but this is the best .....

This is the undisputed greatest album of all time. Suffocation took death metal to a whole new level, and this was their finest moment. Nine tracks of death metal perfection. Frank Mullen is THE death vocalist, plain and simple. Doug Cerrito and Terence Hobbs were the best guitar duo since Jeff Hanneman and Kerry King, and Doug Bohn's drumming is unmatched. He writes very complex beats and makes amazing, yet non-excessive use of the double bass. As a drummer, I really look up to this guy, and can only hope to achieve his skill level. "Thrones of Blood" is THE greatest song ever written, a testament to brutality. Doug's constant, thunderous double bass will leave you breathless. Those who want death metal, metal, MUSIC at its peak need look no further than this album. Suffocation shall indeed be greatly missed.

I imagine there are a lot of people out there who are intrigued by all the glowing reviews that Suffocation gets on ..., but are hesitant to buy their CD's. After all, they play a genre of metal that seems to have been labeled "brutal death," so the casual music fan probably fears that something so extreme-sounding will only be accessible to the most hardened metalhead.

Well, I'm here to tell you that ANYONE who's willing to listen to this CD with an open mind will be able to appreciate its brilliance. Until very recently Pantera was the heaviest, most non-mainstream act I listened to, Tool was my favorite band, and I'd barely heard any death metal at all...then I decided to try Suffocation, and was immediately hooked.

So, what makes this album so great? I'll start with Doug Bohn's drumming. While many mainstream rock bands use the same slow, simplistic bass/snare beat throughout an entire song, Suffocation was the first band I heard that really demonstrated that drums could be more than a glorified metronome. Doug plays quite fast and does an awesome job keeping things fresh, never allowing his playing to stagnate or become predictable. His beats are so complex, his fills so fast and clean, and his double-bass drum control so tight that I often can't believe what I'm hearing - it just doesn't sound humanly possible to have that kind of coordination. Probably the best drummer I've ever heard besides, well...the other drummers who've played in Suffocation (Mike Smith, Dave Culross).

Then there's the guitar work of Doug Cerrito and Terrance Hobbs. If you're tired of the so-called "nu-metal" sound and its talentless guitarists who substitute lame sound effects for true solos (....., for example), you'll really like what you hear on this album. As the previous reviewer ..... mentioned, the riffing is incredibly heavy, but always remains fast and well-played. And the solos are right up there with what you'd hear from old Metallica. In fact, I think Suffocation's lead guitar work is even better than Metallica's because both Hobbs and Cerrito can solo, and they occasionally alternate back-and-forth with their leads, Slayer-style. The title track has an especially amazing example of this.

As for the vocals, Frank uses the low "death growl" which is fairly common in this style of music. Fortunately, he's one of the few death metal vocalists who make it sound GOOD. Many death vocalists try way too hard to make their voices go lower than they're capable of; these "singers" end up being COMPLETELY unintelligible, and come across as more silly than "brutal." Frank's vocals are just right: they're growly and menacing, yet intelligible, and they fit the music perfectly. Even the lyrics are more intelligent than you'd expect. Although they mostly cover familiar themes like violence and death, the lyrics manage to be eloquent and rather poetic (!) at times, and are nowhere near as disgusting as those of Cannibal Corpse.

In short, this band does everything right, and this album is perfect. There are still some other CD's that I enjoy listening to ALMOST as much, but in terms of musicianship, and how tight they are as a band, Suffocation blows away anything else I've ever heard.

Believe it or not, this is good death metal. I can never seem to reconcile 'good' with 'death metal'. Sure metal heads can, they're metal heads, they're fans, they take what they're given.

This album is excellent. The production is amazing! Very unique sound, very free, very heavy, very limitless sounding (compared with say Nile's 'In their Darkened Shrines' which sounds very held-together and claustrophobic). The structures are ridiculously fluid for metal, and varied too (consider the through-composed 'Thrones of Blood', and the ritornello motif in 'Torn Into Enthrallment'). The drumming isn't always the fastest break-neck blasting WHICH IS GOOD! It breathes! It grooves! And when it does hit those sporadic high speeds, it rips! The solos are beautiful - they really outline the expansive vision of the album. [Look at say Hate Eternal's 'King of All Kings' - where are the good solos? Where are the expansive solos? They would fir rihgt in place on an old Out Cold or otherwise Boston Hardcore album in one of the 40 second songs.] The album has flow throughout, it ebbs and flows as a whole through each of the masterful songs.

Why only four stars? I know it too well know, and after all, it still has the limits of 'heavy metal' on it (ie. not genre-defying and individualistic, though its very individual within metal). Five stars means perfect. How can anything on earth be perfect??

I can't believe I gave this album three stars just last month. Fortunately, I didn't give up on it, and repeated listenings have yielded ever greater rewards. For death metal fans, "Pierced From Within" is a surely a five-star release if there ever was one. It can be a lot to take in at first, but with a little time and effort it all comes together to form one monumentally brilliant slab of extremity. Gut-wrenching heaviness, dizzying technical chops, and the overbearing death vocals of Frank Mullen make this one of those albums that define a genre. Probably more than any other band, Suffocation were able to inject technicality into death metal without sacrificing the brutality that is the genre's hallmark. The music on "Pierced From Within" is a nonstop onslaught of uber-complex riff structures, giga-heavy basslines that reverberate like a jackhammer, and the maniacal drumwork of the great Doug Bohn. And rather than charging straight ahead like many bands do in an effort to be "extreme," Suffocation filled "Pierced From Within" with intricate rhythms and constant tempo changes, ensuring that it never gets boring. Since you can never be entirely sure what's coming next, the songs on this album force you to LISTEN from beginning to end, rather than just setting your brain to "repeat" after the first thirty seconds. Songs like "Thrones Of Blood" shift without warning from midtempo to blindingly fast, resulting in a dynamic roughly akin to being whacked upside the head with a baseball bat. If you like your music heavy, you need to hear this album. That said, even if you're not a "metalhead" per se, you can probably get into Suffocation as long as you have an appreciation for genuine technicality and complexity. And if you like this album, "Effigy Of The Forgotten" is an essential pickup as well.

A lot of death metal is real hit-and-miss with me. Some acts are just too far over the top in their effort to be extreme; particularly in the vocal department. Suffocation's "Pierced From Within", however, was an instant hit with me. The production is a MAJOR improvement over their previos efforts. Most importantly, the vocals are outstanding, and with my first listen Frank overtook Cannibal Corpse's George Fisher as my favorite DM vocalist.

As some previous reviewers have eluded to, I think the bottom line is that this CD is very accessible to metal fans who typically listen to bands like Slayer, Pantera, Sepultura, etc. If you are looking for some great death metal to get into, most definately give this CD a shot; you won't be disappointed.

I simply cannot take this CD out of my stereo! And I've had it for months now!

Every single song on "Pierced from Within" is a masterpiece of heaviness, brutality, technical wizardry, and melodic genius. The more I listen to it, the more nuances I uncover. Take my word for it, you will never grow tired of this album.

Frank's vocals are the best in the genre -- think of Craig Pillard of Incantation, but with clarity. The drumming, while not the fastest, is certainly among the most diverse and complex; and the phrasing is immaculate. Doug and Terrance are the best death metal guitar duo, period. They both shred into the stratosphere, yet maintain their own distinct styles. Another good measure of a metal album's greatness: the riffs are as difficult to play as the solos. Just try to imitate the openning of "Brood of Hatred" or the second to last section in "The Invoking!"

And for all you base players out there, Chris delivers a crushing performance!

This album also has the most devastatingly brutal production. These guys use six-string guitars tuned down a minor third, and yet they sound ten times heavier than most death metal bands who wield drop-tuned seven-string guitars!

Folks, it doesn't get any better than this!

This CD deserves 999,999,999,999,999,999...stars!!!!!!! I don't know why people are passing up on this CD. First of all, the production on this on is ultra-awesome. Scott Burns is doing the best job of producing this like a classic, and it really is. The drums is punchy with just the right speed and with complete variation. The vocals is very original...extremely guttural in any sense. The guitars are very technical and well, musical. I don't really understand why kids go for the usual Korn and Limp these days. If anyone's looking for the ultimate shredding CD, this should be it...buy it now!

What can I say that has not been said before? This is quite simply one of the best DM albums ever to be released. Apart from the brilliant songwriting, this is a goose-bumps-inducing tour-de-force of 4 musicians and 1 volcalist going to the extremes of physically exhausting music. If they gave out Olympic Medals for Most Intense Musical Performance, Suffocation would've won PLATINUM with this one. Possibly only outdone in sheer intensity by Angelcorpse's "The Inexorable" or Hate Eternal's "Conquering The Throne"!