Government Denies Knowledge
Extinct By Evolution
Inconsistent Consequences
Bloodcult
Signal Zero
Sonderkommando 12
Diary Of A Damaged Brain
Supremacy
Setting The Score
Two Sides Within

Michi Kuster - vocals

Phil Klauser - guitar

Ralf Winzer - bass

Ralph Inderbitzin - guitar

Reto Crola - drums

release date 27.01.2006

 

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Requiem live at the Heavymetal.ch festival in Winterthur 2005

Requiem live in Zürich supp. Malevolent Creation 2004

Requiem live at Messiah-Reunion-Show "Reanimation 2003" in Zürich

preview-review  by dalia "gryphon_spirit" di giacomo____      

Yes. Governments may deny knowledge, but surely the Death legions will not deny that Requiem is  a bright new reality in extreme metal.  I am really so proud that another great Swiss band, emerging  from the formidable  Hel(l)vetic underground, can get a well deserved exposure. With this new full-length effort (that will be released through the German  Massacre Records) Requiem will surely get and win  a larger international audience. 

Grounded in 1997, this 5- piece band has paved  a road to self -determination based on much work and good inspiration, a road  which has passed through important experiences such as memorable live events, open airs,  and noticeable tours (tour with Benediction, Master and Divine Empire through Switzerland, Austria and Germany in 2004 and tour with Vital Remains across 8 European countries in 2005). Already planned is now the European tour with Dismember in February this year. An event that cannot be missed. Requiem supported Messiah  and Hate Plow on  that mythical  Messiah-Reunion-Show "Reanimation 2003" in Zürich, and supported Malevolent Creation in the Swiss stage of the Warkult Tour 2004.  Just think that  Messiah bassist Patrick Herrsche took then part in the line up of Requiem  for a short time,  before the engagement (in late 2004)  of Ralf Winzer (Uppercut, ex Bonedust ex Curare) . After the brilliant  work  begun  by Patrick Herrsche,  the new bassist Ralf  Winzer brought a  fresh wave of dynamism both concerning live acting and contribution to  lyrics, while  guitars are firmly in the hands of  founder members Phil Klauser and Ralph Inderbitzin. Drums are controlled by the talented Reto Crola (also drummer in Punish).

 "Government denies Knowledge"   is  no innovative but nonetheless is a vivid work, mixed very well by Mr. J-F Dagenais. It  is the confirmation that Requiem  are ready to raise the grail of Death. Music forged in fire that unleashes bonebraking panzer-crush  and hell rides, affected also  by a certain blasting spirit. The influence coming from Malevolent Creation and Terrorizer is strong, but a sof tspot for Suffocation surfaces in the cyclic turnarounds, especially in the first  2 tracks, as well as a blasting Canadian attitude indeed.  This music is gloomy , threatening, strong,  and improved by some enthralling hammering moments of midtempo. A destructive, brutal crusher with brain and good appeal.  Good hooklines and brilliant tempo changes are triggered by a propelling double kick and an aggressive rhythmic section. Distorted guitars in the wake of American style swim among  agile pickings and recurrent , insistent segments.  It is good Old School/US Death  Metal  reinterpreted in Switzerland. Brutality, hooklines, blasting patterns, intelligent lyrics: a pleasure and a earthquake in  the jaws of hell. Gloomy and merciless are the grinding vocals also. Singer Michi Kuster , so unbreakable and able to live with every drop of his blood the music on the stage, signs the album with a voice that seems a omen, although i would have recorded it with more accentuation.

The first 2 tracks  offer an  haunted cadenced recursive push, rounded out  by good patterns and hypnotic vehemence,  but i think that  it is at level of track 3 , Inconsistent Consequences, that "Government denies Knowledge"  definately takes off. Though  fast, this song is  more varied with a major blasting temptation. The next track, Bloodcult,  combines recursive patterns with smashing brutality , fast  fierceness that fades into a leaden threatening  slow down re-starting  then the previous fast patterns. Bloodcult leaves an incredible taste of great Death Metal , that here appears in all his classical  features both concerning erratic tendency and catchy motives. It follows then  one of the best tracks of this album: Signal Zero.  Though Signal Zero is using the same  schemes of the tracks 3 and 4, it is based on almost inversed riffs if compared to the previous songs: all this makes this song  different, with a slight approach to new breed Thrash and Death. Dark , brutal  but also  compelling, hammering, highly percussive catchy it is a track  that enters the mind immediately. 

Sonderkommando 12 is an eruption of intensity and rage, quite short, disruptive. Very interesting are here Ralf Winzer's lyrics, which deal with a delicate theme of the second World War: the Sondercommando 12 in Auschwitz, lyrics maybe inspired by Tim Blake Nelson's  movie The Grey Zone. The story of one of the 13 special squads of Jewish  prisoners who were forced to help exterminate other Jews.

And now comes another pillar of the album: Diary of a damaged Brain:  recurrent loops master again  another haunting song; there are small  changes in the frequency of the hammering riffs  and in the double bass drums   that are simply enthralling, unpredictable,   commanding . Diary of a damaged Brain is  ravenous: drums'n rhythmic switch simple yet mighty changes in chords and in tempo  that are  irresistible. The fast Supremacy keeps up the good work, adding a taste of obscurity and eternal revenge, it is a killer , a headbanging and  moshing -raiser providing  anyway also slower  pounding decelerations. The  slowing  down of Supremacy well meets the ponderous mid tempo of the following Setting the Score, vitalized then anyway by insertions of fast firing. Setting the Score is another song  that will win  the Death legions thanks to the good sequence of  speed and percussive merciless slower grenades and  the trebly sound of  guitars, half way among Black /US Death and Dew-Scented-ian Thrash. Two Sides within  exploits the best characteristics of Setting the Score, putting them in another blasting racetrack in the wake of the previous Supremacy. 

The longer you  hear it, the stronger you will appreciate it. Concerning Old School /US Death a new promise is shining  in Europe. 

No one to blame, we choose to be prey
They are the vultures, we the mice
But for those lives served on a tray
Get the fuck up!!! Think you live twice?!?

Nothing heard... seen... done
Government denies knowledge

rating: 8,8/10

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