Around this time last year, I read that Roadrunner Records signed a new band. The name made me do a double take: "What? Did Roadrunner finally come to their senses and sign Cult Of Daath? Wow, that’s unexpected." To my disappointment, they did not sign Cult Of Daath, but a relatively unknown band that was simply Dååth (pronounced, apparently, like the "o" in "goth."). Who are these guys? Well, apparently they’re so bloody fucking awesome that James Fucking Murphy was tooting their horn at every chance he could. Murphy personally asked my arch nemesis, Monte Connor, to sign Dååth to Roadrunner. Murphy said- and I quote- "After completing the work on these songs, I knew I had something innovative and genre-bending on my hands. These guys have something extra, something special… not your run-of-the-mill death metal formula, but something ‘beyond’ that transcends the norms for the genre. I can’t wait for the world to hear this band and hopefully feel the same renewed enthusiasm for extreme metal as a true art form that I now feel."

Roadrunner feels so strongly about this album that I’m going to repeat one of the lines from their press release: "The Hinderers is a strong return to the classic death metal/black metal sound that ruled the scene in the early ’90s… The result is a classic, progressive and technical death metal album." Oh, this is going to be interesting.

"Great," you’re probably saying to yourself. "James Murphy had a decently solid album with his own Disincarnate, put out great stuff with Death, and is generally a good metal musician. Maybe- just maybe- Roadrunner is turning over a new leaf."

I got bad news, Slappy. Murphy is a fucking idiot. A grade "A" fucking idiot. Dååth is insipidly written, mildly skilled, moronic death metal in the vein of Angela’s Titties (Arch Enemy) fellating Static-X’s cock, complete with a male derivation of Angela strutting his booty to Static-X’s pedo keyboardist’s phat dance beats. Yes, that’s right: "phat." Let’s not deny it: this is booty music disguised as legitimate death metal. And it sucks.

Okay, so I’m exaggerating on that last part about booty music, but I’m not exaggerating on the rest. The Hinderers seriously blows. As "Subterfuge" kicks in Sean Farber’s vocals give off a distinct Angela Gossow impersonation (with less vocal effects) and the tight guitar playing overlapped with the melodic keyboards and sound effects distinctly reminds me of Arch Enemy- ERRRR- Angela’s Titties’ last couple of albums mixed with typical melodic death metal clichés and good deal of orchestral elements. It goes like this for the majority of the album. There are some decent hooks here or there, but their ability to engage the listener is only inverse to the listener’s experience with death metal; you’d have to be almost entirely ignorant of basic popular death metal acts (much less the cult stuff) to find this entertaining. In addition, you’re going to hear legions of people talking about how great a technical death metal album this is. They are lying. The musicianship is tight- this is true- but it’s not any more technical than any other melodic death metal band. Frankly, anyone calling this a technical death metal album is merely throwing around buzz words and jargon to grab as much "LOOK AT ME; I’M METAL!!!!!" attention as possible.

Then you get towards the end and "Who Will Take the Blame" kicks in. And here’s where it starts getting really bad. I mean REALLY BAD. Remember my review of Doomsday Machine by Angela’s Titties? Apparently Dååth saw it wise to reuse that Necrophagia-style spooky synth effect. And throw in techno at about a minute and fifty seconds in. Now, I won’t hold it against them that much because it’s one song and sort of subtl- WAIT NO WHAT’S THIS? Oh, they go straight Static-X with "Dead on the Dance Floor" in their techno use! And the sad part? Static-X actually sounds better. Let me repeat and rephrase that for you: Dååth is so fucking inept and pathetic that they managed to make a techno-fusion song that can’t beat anything from Static-X’s Wisconsin Death Trip. It’s not like techno samples can’t be fused with metal. Ahumado Granujo put out Splatter Tekk, which was a kickass meshing of Czech goregrind with gabber meshing and interludes. It was brutal, intense, catchy, but still fucking metal. Apparently Dååth wants to pull off the same thing, but they can’t. Why? Because they are Dååth and apparently can’t do anything right.

So what was that Roadrunner was saying again? A return to old school death/black metal? Hmm, I got a bunch of Death, Massacre, Insanity, Atheist, Possessed, God Macabre, Revenant, Autopsy, Asphyx, Monstrosity, and Incantation albums here (among many others) and yeah, I’d say that’s bullshit. Wait, no, complete and utter LIE would be a better term. Oh wait, maybe Roadrunner is just referring to its own early ninety bands? Well, I got Gorguts, Suffocation, and the first Immolation album here and they’re also calling Roadrunner a fucking cock-gobbling liar. This isn’t a Blood Freak, Mausoleum, or The Chasm album and Roadrunner needs to stop pretending that it is. As for the old school black metal claim, I hope whoever wrote that had a hard time swallowing that partially solidified load of Monte Connor’s cum.

A progressive technical death metal record? Death metal is SATURATED with progressive technical metal albums. And you know what? All of them run circles around Dååth. Faster than light speed at that. To call this technical death metal would be an insult to Negativa, Gorguts, Anomalous, Atheist, Theory in Practice, and many more bands.

Oh, what’s that you say, James Murphy? Dååth brings something new to the table? Reusing generic synth effects from the last Necrophagia album, the symphonic effects of Psypheria and Kadenzza (you hear that? IT’S NOT NEW YOU COCK ASS), and nu-tinged electronic beats does not make you new and original. Canada, the Czech Republic, and to a lesser extent Australia have been doing just fine in bringing about "something ‘beyond’ that transcends the norms for the genre." James Murphy needs to check out those regions sometime.

Dååth’s The Hinderers is a horrible album full of mediocre riffs and poor outside influence. I’d even go as far as to say that The Hinderers is the metal equivalent of holocaust denial and Nazi sympathizing: you can only support this album if you deny extreme metal history and take pride in shitty metal and buzzwords. If you buy this album, you deserve every ounce of ridicule from your metal friends. What else have when learned from this horrifying experience? If this is what James Murphy sees for the future of metal, someone lock him far away from any Death tribute material. He’s lost it…

Written By: Necro-tron