Cephalectomy is one strange beast. I bought their 2004 effort Eclipsing the Dawn on a whim and I fucking loved every minute of it. They brought about this strange, Lovecraftian-obsessed technical grind band that was being straddled and simultaneously given the reach around by old school Kataklysm, spewing its load on the listener. And it was an amazing, dare I say homo-erotically gratifying and tasty load at that. You wanted to be made Cephalectomy’s bitch and Cephalectomy’s bitch you were made.

This split- on the other hand- sees a more reserved side of Cephalectomy. The crazy "mystigrind" of past releases is still there, but the effort is focused around a more forward death/grind approach obsessed with horror films. The dual screech/beast vocals are ever present, sounding like a tumbling battle between a banshee and a behemoth locked in mortal combat. The drum work isn’t just a stream of linear, constant blast beats and demonstrates a nice variety of rhythm and structure. The riffs haven’t deviated too far from the catchy, yet insane sound of Eclipsing the Dawn yet they do show a better harnessing of melody and structure. And the horror motif is caught perfectly by Cephalectomy: running the gamut from Herbert West in "Resurrection Injection" to horror’s favorite Michele Soavi film in "Dellamorte, Dellamore" the split gives Cephalectomy the best shit to fuse with their catchy, insane death/grind. Fucking ace material is what to be had by Cephalectomy on this split.

Then there is the matter of Bound In Human Flesh. The band is new to me, yet is headed by a pretty familiar name. It started as a one man death metal project by Jamie Vautour, one of the blokes behind Obscene Eulogy, a Canadian Impaled Nazarene clone that actually had the distinction of getting Mika from Impaled Nazarene on vocals. Given his work with Obscene Eulogy, I wasn’t too excited going into this side of the split. Obscene Eulogy had its ups and downs, but ultimately it fell to the way side on my cd player.

And this more than likely will be the fate befalling Bound In Human Flesh, too. It’s standard, catchy blackened death metal with a drum machine pounding away in the background. The riffs are enjoyable and fast as hell, and the drum programming is definitely better than some grindcore bands I’ve heard, but it comes across as overly simplistic and derivative. The music is by all means catchy- and "Zombie Children" is pretty god damn cool in all respects- but in the end there’s nothing stopping you from hitting the skip button on this half of the split. It’s definitely worthy of a few listens though.

The Cephalectomy material definitely makes this release a worthy grab. They pound the material into your skull like a horrible mud wrestling match between a bikini-ed Cthulhu and Stuart Gordon, getting down and dirty in their chaotic grind. Bound In Human Flesh doesn’t fare as well, but is worth a look, kind of like a half-way attractive ring girl calling the rounds at the mud wrestling match. Give it a shot!

Written By: Necro-tron