Customer Reviews

Utopia Banished (Bonus Dvd)

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Utopia Banished has got to be one of the best Napalm Death albums ever. This in my honest opinion was when they were at their peak, just a great fast paced hardcore punk influenced death metal and grindcore album. Every aspect of Napalm Death is still intact; the fast grinding guitars, the inhuman quickness of the drums and Barney Greenways unmistakable roar (I love it when he says I ABSTAAAAAAAIN!!!!!). The album is uncompromising in its brutal heaviness. The lyrics are brilliant as always, dealing with social political issues which the music matches to a T. There is also a vast improvement here, for example "the world keeps turning" has a good chugging metal groove which takes hold immediately which makes it one of my favorite ND songs along with "suffer the children" and "Plague rages". "The World Keeps Turning" is the first single from the album and it's great. Nothing but hardcore-like thrashing skank beats mixed in with grind core blast beats and some serious death metal overtones. "Cause And Effect (Part II)" is one of the better examples of death metal-influenced grind core. "Distorting The Medium" has one of the better stat/stop intros and is quite unique. "Got Time To Kill" could have been "Dementia Access" part 2 for the most part with guitarist Mitch Harris' insane shrieks. "Awake(To A Life of Misery)" is total double-bass and blast beats and then what is probably the best song on the entire album is "Contemptuous". With samples from the movie "Full Metal Jacket" The rest of the album is as brilliant especially "christening the blind" which was my second favorite song, the power groove takes hold from first cut to last and listening to this album is like being punched in the face with a knuckle buster. "Utopia Banished" is without a doubt faster and most extreme version of what "Harmony Corruption" could have been, but instead they took one step forward. The album is a total of 15 songs of pure death metal-influenced grind core in the fact that it's more extreme than death metal, but too well-produced and too well-played for most grind core bands to even attempt at playing. If you can imagine a hundred Tasmanian devils running around in a whirlwind of destroying everything in it's path, total manic brilliance. Here we have a re-packaging of this classic album which saw the Brum moshers in typically brutal form. Perhaps of more interest to established fans, though is a most comprehensive and impressive accompanying DVD, which includes (deep breath!) five promo clips, two complete concerts from their earlier years in the late 80's and early 90's, and two tracks from the BBC Arena Heavy Metal Special, one of the aforementioned TV appearances which helped bring them into the public consciousness. This cd/dvd is just to awesome to pass up and is an essential album for grindcore and death metal fans, SO WHAT THE F&*^ ARE YOU WAITING FOR!?, GET THIS ALBUM NOW!.

I got into Napalm Death when I got the "Harmony Corruption" cd.This Limited Edition of "Utopia Banished"is indeed a Earache Classic.Sounds digitaly remasterd but no bonus tracks.The DVD is killer with all their videos and Live Performances inculding rare TV clips with guitarist Bill Steer(Before joining Carcass) and then Vocalist Lee Dorian(Later formed his band Cathedral).I had not gotten a chance to get the DVD.This is a cool Napalm Death Limited Edition.

Utopia Banished has been what I've thought of for years as my favorite Napalm Death album. They've put out one powerful album after another, but this one has always sounded to me to have just a little bit extra of everything; fire, intensity, brutality, and even catchiness. It represented a shift back towards a more raw grindcore sound, but not a total one. The previous album, Harmony Corruption, had ten standard-length death metal songs, a marked difference from their earlier output. Utopia Banished boasts fifteen tracks, eleven of which are under three minutes long. The style is influenced more by hardcore than Harmony Corruption's was, with most of the songs having more of a swinging energy to them. Trying to mention individual highlights is somewhat pointless because each song is formidable and memorable. Amazing riffs, thundering rhythm section, and one of Barney's outstanding performances make Utopia Banished an absolute must-have for a fan of the band, and a good place to start for anyone interested in checking them out for the first time.

This limited edition version is an almost shockingly good value. It comes with Napalm Death The DVD, which is a full concert from '89 and footage of the songs Scum and You Suffer from a BBC TV metal show. It also has the Salisbury Arts Centre show, which is on the Live Corruption CD and DVD. Besides these two concerts, the bonus disc has the music videos for Mass Appeal Madness, The World Keeps Turning, Suffer the Children, Plague Rages, Greed Killing, and Breed to Breathe. I'm a big fan of Napalm, and I already needed a copy of my favorite album of theirs on CD, so getting two extra titles from their discography plus their music videos was icing on the cake. Anyone who likes the old material from these guys should definitely go for this Earache Classic edition, because if you don't already have The DVD and Live Corruption, it just doesn't make sense not to.

1992's Utopia Banished from Napalm Death was the band's fourth full length studio album and is a very strong and fondly remembered record that contains a lot of the band's well loved material. Utopia Banished was the second album to incorporate two guitar players and use a lot of Death Metal influences within the songwriting, following up their classic but initially maligned 1990 record Harmony Corruption which some fans criticized for its shifting from grindcore to Death Metal. Utopia Banished remedied this by mixing the two styles into a harsh and furious yet intelligent style that retained the sophistication of their third album but also tried to recreate the raw punk fury of their first two studio albums.

In addition, it was their first album to feature the complete definitive (and most common) Napalm Death line-up that (with the exception of Jesse Pintado's tragic death) remained constant on every single Napalm Death album ever since; with Mitch Harris and Jesse Pintado on Guitars, Shane Embury on Bass, as well as Vocals from Mark `Barney' Greenway and for the first time, Danny Herrera on the drums.

Everything about the album is good; the lyrics are the most developed and intelligent they have ever been up to this point, the songs mix Death and Grind well, creatively mixing groovier and thrashier moments with raw furious grinding and blast beats for heavy and fast songs that can still be memorable and catchy. Even The production is good for what it is, while not recorded at Morrisound Studios with Scott Burns like their previous effort, it is ably handled by Colin Richardson who does a great job for the time.

Album highlights include the catchy `I Abstain,' as well as the famous single `The World Keeps Turning,' and `Idiosyncratic.'

Overall; If you like the band then Utopia Banished is certainly something you should consider picking up, it has a fair amount of classic material and is definitely worth your time. It may not be the go-to album for Napalm Death beginners but anyone who is serious about the band will have positive things to say about the record, which is a fairly great recommendation in itself.