Whitechapel is an american death metal band from Tennessee that had its debut in 2006. They have just released their most recent studio album "Mark Of The Blade" and I am here to tell you that this violent masterpiece will literally melt your face off with its brutal riffs and disturbing growls that make the hair on your arm stand up.
Its near impossible to find a flaw in this record with amazing drum fills, guitar riffs that make your jaw drop and sinister vocals that are sure to haunt your dreams "Mark Of The Blade" is easily the best and most evil album Whitechapel has dropped to date. Thats saying something to after the 2014 smash hit "Our Endless War " which was easily one of the best death metal records of the year if not decade. But it seems that instead of coasting on their previous success the southern hell raisers are back and angrier than ever.
Each record Whitechapel diversifies a bit in terms of sound always keeping their fans and audience intrigued, never knowing which way the record is going to go. "Mark Of The Blade" keeps some of the groove metal influences that we first saw on "Our Endless War," the record also revitalizes some of the elements that we heard in Whitechapel's 2012 debut album "Buzzsaw." Specifically the extreme death core elements and simple but brutally savage guitar loops that made everyone fall in love with Whitechapel in the first place.
The singlehanded biggest change on this record from all other Whitechapel records is the introduction of lead vocalist Phil Bozeman singing clean verses. Completely changing the vibe of the band and giving it more of a death core feel. Now Phil Bozeman quite possibly has the most recognizable voice in the death metal community so many fans were stand offish when they first heard that Whitechapel was introducing clean vocals. However not only does it work but it makes the record even better, for a man who growls like something from beyond this dimension it came as a shock at how amazing of a singer Phil is. The man can scream like a demon and sing like an an angel giving the album an extra layer of emotion and depth that we haven't seen on any of the other records to date.
Now if your sitting at home loosing your mind because you dont like your metal to be contaminated with clean vocals, fear not because only two tracks on the new album actually have clean vocals. "Decennium" and "Bring Me Home are the only two songs that have any clean vocals on them, the track out of the two that Im going to focus on is "Bring Me Home." The reason Im homing in on this song in particular is because it is by far the deepest and most meaningful song on the record and most likely in Whitechapel's discography. "Bring Me Home" deals with the death of Phil's late father and the clean vocals as well as the growls carry a lot of depth with them. You can hear the pain in Phil's voice as he sings about his father and in this song the clean vocals really serve an important purpose in getting the message of the song across.
The next song that I loved was the title track "Mark Of The Blade," this song is classic Whitechapel vicious, violent and a metal masterpiece. The track is extremely well done between the speed metal like guitar riffs and relentless drumming it is a musical masterpiece in itself, now add in the quick evil vocals that add the extra element of hate that this song needs to really get the adrenaline coursing through your veins. Like some of Whitechapel's best songs I have no idea what the song is about or what the "Mark Of The Blade" is but while this song is thundering on and the blood is rushing to my head I really dont care. This song is so harsh that I dont even think Ghandi could resist head banging to it. This is by far my favourite song on the record possibly even by Whitechapel and seems to be almost like a sequel to "The Saw Is The Law."
"The Void" is another incredibly well done song, which again made me head bang almost instantaneously. The song starts out hard with an intro that immediately caused my heart to skip a beat and may have left me partially deaf in one ear , but I really didn't mind it was well worth it just to hear this incredibly evil track. "The Void" only builds until it climaxes at a relentless power metal solo with a tuned up guitar that is expertly combined with the tuned down guitars that carry on their onslaught throughout the solo. "The Void" possibly has the best breakdown on the album as well as Phil yells out his last rage filled words before the band jumps into a face melting breakdown that rocks you to your core.
As you can probably tell from this review I absolutely love Whitechapel and for good reason, with so many metal bands succumbing to the pressures of the masses and releasing commercialized toned down albums. Its nice to see Whitechapel flying the death metal flag high and representing the metal community in the angriest and most offensive way possible. We metal heads salute your service. Whitechapel is currently on the warped tour and for some unknown reason you haven't bought their new album "Mark Of The Blade" then do it now because I can guarantee you won't be disappointed.
Headbangers Heaven Productions.
2016 All Rights Reserved.
Eric Snelling.
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