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Dispatched
- Terrorizer - Crash Music
10 Songs
Running Time: 48:52
Five years after 2000's exercise in beat-your-head-against-the-wall
boredom, Motherwar, Sweden's Dispatched return to lure us out
of our boredom and into a state of coma with Terrorizer.
Sure, things begin normally enough, but midway through the
title track - when the gerbil-chatter of dual keyboardists
takes off - it's all over but the cringing. I don't understand
what would make Dispatched think that the term originality
is synonymous with piling every sub-genre of metal (except
doom, thank Candlemass) into every song, and
praying something stands out. Well, in this case, the only
thing to survive amid
the rubble of mediocrity is a sense of nausea. On the rare
occasions when drummer Dennis Nilsson slows to below warp speed,
you can tell he's just biding his time, waiting to assault
the rest of the song with his chopsticks-on-a-cereal box tone.
'Rebellion' has sporadic moments of nonblandness, but soon
we enter the section of the song I'll call "Dance Of The
Seven Faggot Lawn Gnomes And One Forest Elf". Dispatched
are raging in their own forgettable way (playing dress-up as
early In Flames for all they're worth) when
suddenly, "Seamus" -
actually guest musician Par Fura - skips through the studio,
flute in hand and ready to do some folk-metal damage. And damage
he does, though I can't imagine what else could be done to
this out of control musical trainwreck. For those of you in
love with the vocal pattern used in the verses of 'Rebellion',
worry not. It pops up again in 'Beneath The World Of Chaos',
and damned if the keyboards don't at one point (1:19-1:30)
completely rip off the chorus of Einherjer's
'A New Earth'. "Seamus" finds
some Swedish bagpipes laying about the forest glade near the
end of 'Beneath...', and isn't afraid to use them. I'm sure Dispatched has
a bass player, but it's awfully hard to hear him amid the treble-heavy
mix, and maybe it's for the best.
Unneeded cymbal crashes override most of 'Override'. As much
as it pains me to say, this is the only song where Dispatched
manage to almost hit the mark, sticking with a pagan folk theme,
rendering even the flute of "Seamus" listenable.
Not to say that all these folk touches (flute/Swedish bagpipes,
etc.,) are badly played. Oftentimes, though, they're inserted
into musical passages where they have no business being. Flirtations
with a more futuristic style abound in 'Mechanical' and 'Cyber',
the latter beginning with a faux-rap vocal that I'm sure was
meant to sound robotic in its delivery. The keyboard work throughout Terrorizer never manages to do anything but remind me of my
dad's Mannheim Steamroller albums or the drivel birthed by
Windham Hill in the late 80s New Age Music craze. 'Under The
Ice' brings this album to its end, which in my humble opinion
could've happened much sooner.
I guess I shouldn't be surprised by the band that covered 'The
Final Countdown' (on Motherwar) and seemed to take it seriously.
Avoid.
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