Mass Burial –Vomitory, Redemption

The second record by Sweden’s Vomitory, “Redemption” was released in 1999.

Differences from Raped in Their Own Blood are noticeable immediately: the cover art has shifted over to the painted skeleton-in-a-crypt motif, away from the actual picture used for the first album. The music is a bit thrashier than the previous album, and oh, man, a new vocalist. Jussi Linna handles the vocal duties here, and I can’t find out much about him. It actually seems like a brief stint with Vomitory was his only real contribution to the metal scene.

The cover art is not a big deal, just something of interest. The painted image had already been a long death metal tradition, and everyone loves the Dan Seagrave or Necrolord covers. Redemption’s cover art is a bit less impressive than anything either of those guys ever did, featuring a pretty cartoonish skeleton that’s pretty clearly supposed to be writhing in agony coming out of a coffin. But, it’s pretty campy.

The vocals. Not bad per say, but they are on the branch of death metal deliveries that are more croaking than growling: not a shouting like Johnny Hedlund (Unleashed) or a shrieking like Jon Tardy (Obituary), certainly not a growl like Fisher or Benton; but more like a death metal Abbath, that Popeye-frog delivery. I’m trying to remember where else I’ve heard this style and all I can think of is “that Krabathor album,” but I don’t even know which one it is.

Anyway, Redemption goes for a much bouncier, thrashier approach to death metal than the more traditional debut album, and the results are pretty fun. Here there are more obvious Swedish death metal tendencies, as things are a bit catchier and faster in general. The slowed tempo approach reappears on tracks like “Heaps of Blood,” and parts of “Forever in Gloom.” The first two tracks are fairly unremarkable, but five of the last six are a really good listen. One of those last six songs is a God Macabre cover, and as a cover song I’m inclined to leave it out of the final tally. But where Raped in Their Own Blood needed a bit of a recharge towards the middle of the album to reengage interest, Redemption needs to get past its first two songs, which are not bad but don’t really do anything for me. Maybe it’s the different vocalist, and the fact that, when I first queued up Redemption I’d heard Raped in Their Own Blood three consecutive times, and so was not prepared for such a drastic change. It is a jarring difference at first, but one that is reasonably quickly overcome, and then the album is another batch of solid death metal tunes.

This album is a lot more Swedish in terms of its death metal. It has a lot of the trademarks of the style: the buzzy guitars, the less constant blastbeats, the general bouncy tone to the music and the excellent collection of riffs. Listening to the record, I can’t help but make mental comparisons to Dismember and Grave and Entombed, and that’s not a bad thing. This is no melodeath, to be sure, which I think is often what “Swedish death metal” brings to peoples’ minds. This is the real McCoy, and Vomitory presents it really well. They may not have been the band that came to mind as quickly as the aforementioned, but two records in to the discography, and I feel confident saying that they are a quality band that is as good a representative of the style as any of the better known outfits.