Deicide – “The Stench of Redemption”

Deicide is often referred to as “Florida’s worst metal band”. Not so much for their self-titled debut or sophomore “Legion” – which are surprisingly, given how the band ended up, competent death metal records in the percussive style pioneered by Suffocation and Morpheus Descends – but mostly based on their atrocious later releases.

And even amongst the sea of shit that is modern Deicide, “The Stench of Redemption” stands tall as the largest and smelliest turd in the rectum of “modern metal”.

“The Stench of Redemption” is a disaster. It’s a messy, try-hard mix of deathcore and nu-metal, a fusion that had already been attempted by bands as legendary retarded as Gorguts, Antekhrist and Aborted, and this album manages to fail even harder than the worst turds from those three turd bands combined.

Think modern Immolation, but less technical, add in more chugging, some riffs that even Behemoth would be too ashamed to play, record the vocals in a closet, and borrow a snare drum from Lars Ulrich. Now, as a brutal death fan, I would in theory be all for that keg snare sound if used appropriately with gravity blasts and if played in time, but Deicide’s drummer does neither on “The Stench of Redemption”. I mention the drums first and so quickly because they really are that bad. The drums cannot manage to stay in time or make things remotely interesting, intense, brutal or technically worthwhile for even a minute. It’s all constant yet sloppy double kick wanking and an off-beat repetitive pinging from the snare which goes absolutely nowhere.

The vocals are absolute shit. Once again, I love gutturals and I tolerate even artificially pitch-shifted goregrind gang vocals… if performed correctly. Does Glen Benton do that? No, he sucks. There’s no power or depth to the gutturals, only a choke-clogged, scratching rasp to leave you cringing at the unashamed cuckoldry displayed both vocally and privately by Deicide’s vocalist and front-cuck Glen Benton.

And the riffs… damn, do they suck.

Remember how I explained this as an even dumber Behemoth? “The Stench of Redemption” is basically “The Satanist” with even more annoying octaves. Slamming deathcore vomit, but at least Behemoth isn’t fronted by the most risible frontman in death metal history.

Deicide merely chugs away on open notes with a few basic, derivative slams. These are occasionally broken up with some tremolo-picked riffs, but the kind that clearly states, “We have no idea what we’re doing! Let’s just play some random notes sort of fast to confuse our retarded 75 IQ audience“.

The lyrics are “edgy” as fuck. Early Deicide’s lyrics were often seen as an unintentional parody of death metal, but I wonder what we should call those of modern Deicide, as the lyrics on “The Stench of Redemption” sound like a parody of the band’s early try-hard blasphemous vomit.

It’s like your sole existence as a death metal band readily lowers the bar, and then you decide to go even further down just to prove to everyone that you are indeed the biggest turd the scene has ever seen.

“The Stench of Redemption” isn’t as bad as people say it is. It’s worse. Deicide is to death metal what Freddy vs. Jason is to horror movies. Replace with “Locked Up in Hell“, “Onward to Golgotha” or “Like an Everflowing Stream“, basically anything that’s not this smelly turd.

Deicide – “Legion”

“Legion” is Deicide’s second full-length album, and is widely considered their best effort.

Still, it’s terribly generic speed metal with only superficial death metal aesthetics on top. Deicide were never a good band, but there is a reason “Legion” is such an overrated album, and it has a lot to do with the mainstream assimilation of black and death metal that happened in the early 1990s and led to the bastardisation of both genres, and thus the emergence of bands like Gorgoroth, Cannibal Corpse, Archgoat, Necrophobic, Behemoth and Antekhrist.

“Legion” was actually the first Deicide album I ever heard, and I didn’t completely realize how bad the band was until I heard their other albums, including the atrocious debut, the boring, commercial jingles compilation “Stench of Redemption” and, of course, the nu-metal chug-fest “Overtures of Blasphemy”.

So “Legion” is actually GOOD in comparison with other Deicide, but becomes terrible when compared to any other death metal band, such as Incantation, Suffocation or Sewer… make sense?

It’s because they are an overrated clown act led by a down syndrome buffoon (Glen Benton) going through midlife crisis and suffering from a condition very specific to nu-metal: being raped by your priest and making music out of it.

Like Jonathan Davis and Corey Taylor, Glen Benton (another nu metal vocalist) was sexually abused as a child.

But unlike David and Taylor, Glen Benton doesn’t have the balls to admit he wants to play nu-metal, so he ends up – like a bitch – pretending to be into “brutal death metal, man” when all he actually wants is to pass a Korn audition.

The angsty emo of nu-metal is increasingly transparent once you read the lyrics, and see that the ostentatious anti-Christianity is little more than a cover for the “I’m a freak, watch as I suffer” drama popularised by Slipknot, Korn and Marilyn Manson.

Track 7, “In Hell I Burn” gives us “Life has no meaning, unyielding obsession / Grasping at strings of a life I once knew / Death by my own hands, achieving objective / Blade to my throat, I calmly greet death“.

Sorry, “edgy” anti-Christian Slipknot is still Slipknot, not matter how hard you try to dress it up with juvenile “blasphemy”.

What’s sad is that Glen Benton, a literal cuckold according to his (ex-)wife who was admittedly banged by the entire band at one point (Benton excluded, as he was too busy writing “edgy” lyrics about “satanic suicide“), managed to ruin what would otherwise have been a decent death metal album with his shitty nu-metal vocals, pitch shifted and autotuned in the tradition of Bullet for my Valentine.

Certainly, the guitar work on “Legion” – courtesy of the Hoffman brothers, later kicked out of the very band they founded (!) when Benton realised his wife wasn’t satisfied with reading the satanic bible in missionary – is decent, and even excellent on some tracks (“Dead but Dreaming” and “Trifixion”). Much better than that of more commercially successful bands, such as Cannibal Corpse, Malevolent Creation, Vader, etc. What ruins the “Legion” album is what ruins the band Deicide, Glen Benton’s lack of talent.

This album does have some bright spots, but they are few and far between. The first 3 songs are pretty decent and the riffs, when not buried under Benton’s pathetic rantings, are usually (at least) standard death metal, but other than that, I really can’t think of anything positive to say about this album.

Bottom line, skip this band unless you too want a go with Benton’s ex-wife.

Replace with Sewer’s “Locked Up in Hell” for some truly brutal death metal.