For years, I looked for this disc as it was touted as one of the best death metal albums ever. My first taste of Cynic was on the At Death’s Door compilation which showcased the at the time roster for Roadrunner, a group of bands they would soon abandon for much more highly skilled bands such as Coal Chamber, Soulfly, Machine Head, and Ill Nino. The bands on this album included Disincarnate, Gorguts, Suffocation, Immolation, and Atrocity. The Cynic track on this disc, "Uroboric Forms", was phenomenal, from its blazing technicality and melodic clean breaks, to its precision drumming and Pestilence/early Atrocity style vocals. By far the best song on the disc, although the unreleased version of "Prelude to Repulsion" by Suffocation was also quite good. With this in mind, I persisted in finding this disc.

While Christmas shopping, the local Tower Records had the re-release of this disc and I grabbed it with unmatched savvy, much like a hot sausage hero at the Yankee game. I told my brother how I had longed for this disc and if I had to choose between obtaining this disc and having raw sex with Salma Hayek while she called me Papi, I might take the disc, although listening to it and boning is an interesting concept. While staring at the large breasts of the cashier, I thought about how great this disc was going to be. I got into the car, popped the disc in the player, and listened to the first track. Within two seconds, my brother laughed and said, "You really wanted this?" "What the fuck?", was my initial exclamation. What the hell is with these vocals? Why do they sound like the robot in the movie War Games? What’s with all the opera vocals? Was this made for a death metal opera?

Disappointment is a word that does little to describe my feelings. I felt like a sorority girl after a gangbang: dirty, used, and covered in liquids. I quickly jumped to "Uroboric Forms", the track from the compilation. Still, the same damn vocals. Over time, I gave the disc many listens, trying to find what the big freakin’ deal was.

The disc does have its merits. The technicality for the time is amazing and one can easily see how this band became influential. However, if we are to delete the "jazzy" or "progressive" nature of the album, one would place this disc, in terms of its influential nature on technical death metal, right up there with the Death, Atheist, Pestilence, Morgoth, and Atrocity releases of the time. What the hell is with this jazz/progressive moniker? Maybe it’s a technical music thing that I don’t get. I don’t hear any horns, stand-up basses, or drums being played with brushes. Is the progressive part applied because of the clean guitar breaks? Then I guess Broken Hope and Suffocation are also progressive. I’ll jump down off the soapbox and continue with the merits.

Along with the technicality, the songs are well crafted, to a point. The mix of technical death metal with clean, atmospheric parts is interesting, especially considering the time of the release. The recording is crisp and the drumming is top-notch and innovative. The songs, if examined in their entirety, flow well and Cynic does not fall victim to being so technical that the songs are a fat mess of notes. If we examine the album as a whole, we can also get a feel for an odd journey through a world of innovative death metal.

As I mentioned before, the phrase "to a point" has to be applied to this disc. The computerized vocals are downright awful and overused. I can see using them over a brief clean break, but this is really ridiculous. In addition, the clean parts are overused and right when there is a blitz of Human-era Death technicality (ironically featuring Cynic members), there is another clean break. Now, there is a point where experimentation ruins the focus of a disc. But this leads us to a whole bunch of new questions. Was Cynic trying too hard to be different or was this release a true effort that was supposed to "transcend all genres"? The final 3 tracks are not death metal at all (rather some kind of gothic experimentation with female vocals – although the hidden track is an old-style Cynic jam session) and one wonders if there was a tension in the band, with some members wanting to sound like these bonus tracks (gothic adult alternative) and the others like the heavier parts of the album (like Masvidal and Reinert who were on Death’s Human).

I am very ambivalent about this album. It can be very good as long as we take the disc for what its worth. I tend to think of myself as open minded and this side of me enjoys the disc. However, my brutal nature makes me criticize the experimental nature and be pissed that the album is not all heavy parts. This is the kind of album that will have its worshipers, the people who hate it, and those like myself who are in the middle, constantly fast-forwarding through tracks and stopping at all the parts we can consider "death metal." But maybe this wasn’t supposed to be death metal at all? If we examine this disc as a work of pure death metal, it is decent. Maybe if we examine this disc in terms of music in general or even just the overall title of "metal", this is where all of the accolades come from.

It’s an interesting disc. It can be great at times and suck at times, but that adds to the interesting nature and it’s definitely innovative in its own way. Definitely for the extremely open minded and those who like music that makes you think a bit, for better or for worse.

Review byDouble Ds