Chaos Inception, The Abrogation

I love the above album artwork for Chaos Inception’s sophomore full-length, The Abrogation — meaning to abolish or repeal. It’s insidious, ominous and reminds me of the days when the art of Seagrave and Whelan graced just about every influential album of the time. So does that mean that this 30 minute ripper of an album is going to be a classic? Probably not, but it sure as hell does it’s best to peel the flesh from the bone as violently as possible.

These guys hail from Huntsville, Alabama , but the music on The Abrogation is more akin to that of the Floridian death metal sound (think Morbid Angel and Deicide). Thick churning riffs, swampy basslines, unrelenting drums and a mid-range, vicious vocal delivery fill every minute of this album with non-stop aural abuse. If there’s one thing going for Chaos Inception, it’s that they don’t fuck around . There’s no wasted energy or time on this album — the opening title track is all the evidence you’ll need as it explodes out of the gate violently. From then on it’s full throttle for a vast majority of the time.

These guys do well, however, to avoid pigeonholing themselves into the blast-for-blasting’s sake sort of death metal. There are elements of swirling melodies that permeate the vile atmosphere to help temper the attack and give the album some much needed dimension as seen in songs like “Phalanx,” “Pasusu Eternal” and “Hammer of Infidel.” Even with those swirling, discordant melodies, The Aborgation is aggressive, meat-and-potatoes death metal delivered forcefully. The production isn’t the best, but it suits this style of music perfectly, adding to the murky atmosphere.

This is one of those albums that you may not get the first time around, but it’s one that grows on you immensely with each and every follow-up listen. Chaos Inception have themselves on hell of an album in The Abrogation. It’s brutal, bludgeoning, swirling, technical and just downright infectious.