My birthday has recently passed and I have had an epiphany of sorts after a few recent events. I have realized a few things:

a) I drank two nights in a row for the first time in a while and although I recovered nicely, I realized that my young years of getting up and “getting my beak wet” the next night can’t happen anymore. I did enjoy two nights of Saranac’s “12 Beers of Winter” to help embrace the holiday season!

b) Hardly any of my older shirts fit anymore, especially since most shirts were made for skinny, long-haired guys. In addition, some of my shirts have hit the double-digits in terms of age, the oldest being my Broken Hope Repulsive Conception tour 1995 shirt, which, when worn, looks like it was spray-painted on.

c) My loss of metal vocabulary – core, scene, and all those seem foreign to me although I thought I once had a handle on them.

d) A feeling of confusion – Where does an old metalhead go? What does he do? Do I have to play my music in my car with the windows up for a fear of being deemed an old creep?

All of these things swirl in my mind and my logic said, “Let’s review an old rare album and relive the good old days!” I refuse to let the rare metal past dissappear in shit-storm of mediocre releases while gems like this go untouched. With that being said, let’s take a looksey at Adnauseam’s first release.

I had the chance to see these guys with Cephalic Carnage at a small club back in 1997 (with 12 other people) and received a yellow cassette tape with a track from each band for my troubles. Although the highlight for my friends was Cephalic Carnage throwing “sticky green buds” around during their set, Adnauseam caught my attention. I had heard one of their songs on the legendary (at least for me) Wild Rags! Records compilations. And I thoroughly enjoyed their set, especially watching the drummer perform some stand-up blast beats. Adnauseam, for this album, had two members of Cephalic Carnage, Zac Joe and Steve Goldberg. And yes, you can jump to conclusions, as the album is chock-full of early Cephalic riffs, but with much more of a morbid and depressing tone. Although this album is full of grind, there are plenty of sections of slow, sludgy parts that add a unique feel to the album.

The guitars are a bit tinny and the snare is loud as hell, but from the first song you can get a good sense as to what the entire album will be like. There are no surprises here and you will not be hit with some odd stoner part in the middle of the song, like some kind of man-butt-lick scene that has infiltrated the straight pornographic industry (Why is that constantly being shown?). It is straight-forward technical death with plenty of memorable riffs. And the memorable riffs are the slower ones which dominate most of the songs. These riffs are mellow and interesting and add texture to the album (too much Food Network). There are some real mellow head-swayers on this album which make it quite different and difficult to parallel. This album is a hidden gem and worthy of finding if you enjoyed early Cephalic Carnage, with the addition of some mellowness and melancholy.

I have read that within the past few years, the band has released an album which is a supposed “Best Of” with some unreleased and live tracks. To be honest, the second album was a big disappointment on all fronts, with most of the atmospheric, doomy stuff gone with more of a focus on bland, run-of-the-mill grind. It would be worth it to find this release.

Review byDouble Ds