DIM-MAK – The Emergence of Reptilian Altars (Willowtip Rec.)

by Brian Krasman (Meat, Mead, Metal)

The new one from Dim Mak…a record that should make you smile and want to pillage a community at the same time. “The Emergence of Reptilian Altars,” an album title that should clue you into the insanity and fun of this fourth full-length, is violent and downright nasty at times, but they always level you with a keen sense of musicianship and a proficiency that’s just not fair. It makes the wait after 2006’s “Knives of Ice” worth all that impatience. The cover itself reminds me of a Nile album, and the band has some traits that kind of remind me of the Egyptian history dorks, even if the content is not the same. Something about the sound makes me feel the same way.

“Emergence” has the debut of singer Joe Capizzi (formerly of The Dying Light), and his inclusion manages to make the band even more beastly than they were in the past. He growls and screams his way through these eight tracks of carnage, almost like a caged, vicious fighter looking for a quick tap-out victory. That’s fitting considering the band’s penchant for the martial arts, though sadly because the words are monstrously indecipherable, I can’t tell if any references made their way into the songs. At least it sounds like a Junior Dos Santos punch to the jaw. As for the rest of these sick bastards, you still have guitar mangler Shaune Kelley (ex-Ripping Corpse, ex-Hate Eternal), bassist Scot Hornick (also ex-Ripping Corpse, ex-Faust), and drummer John Longstreth (current Origin/Gorguts, ex-Malicious Intent, Skinless, etc.), so you know what’s in store. If you’re somehow new to the band, look at their resumes, and imagine your expectations flattened by a bulldozer, because that’s basically what they do to you on kick-punching opener “Thrice Cursed”; the off-kilter savagery of “The Secrets of the Tides of Blood”; the mega-shredding, somewhat doomy “Fully Disassembled”; and the blast-filled, choppy, soaring, and even ambient (um, for a few moments) “Kutulu.”

With horrible holiday traffic and even-worse annual shoppers marring the roadways and making things miserable for the next month, my guess is “The Emergence of Reptilian Altars” might help me make better sense of the absolute awfulness that won’t go away until 2012. Or if anything, it may make me envision applying a rear-naked choke to the next asshole who cuts me off at a stop sign on his way to some doorbuster deal.

For more on the band, go here: http://www.facebook.com/DIMMAK.DEATHMETAL?sk=info

To buy “The Emergence of Reptilian Altars,” go here: http://www.willowtip.com/releases/details/dim-mak-the-emergence-of-reptillian-altars.aspx