Requiem Aeternam: Destiny-Man

Hailing from Uruguay comes the classically influenced Death/Black Metal of Requiem Aeternam with their 3rd release, Destiny-Man (ICorp/Century Media). A tad over the top with their extravagant ideas does not allow for a smooth delivery. With varying musical styles trying to be all be played at once, this creates a very confusing palette and leaves you completely saying "huh, I don't get it."

Destiny-Man is 10 tracks with each song being based around the inspiration from 10 different Classical composers. From Beethoven to Debussy to Rachmaninoff, the overall concept seems very interesting until you hear the Death Metal killing of this concept. Confusing riffage with even more confusing melodic structure over top of actual Classical ideas just leads to even more confusion. The Classical element can at times lend itself to the Death Metal genre, but within this context it just aids to the overall bombastic nature. Add to it the overly annoying Death Metal drum machine drumming, although it is claimed to be a an actual drummer, me suspects foul play with the completely mechanical and sterile sounds brought forth. There are so many blast beats played over music that doesn't seem to even fit together is the basic gaff here. But the thing is, when Requiem Aeternam slows things down to an understandable Prog like stance, they get close to an Opeth-like feel, so there is an element of talent within their self produced confusion.

Destiny-Man is a difficult listen. It is quite honestly all over the place with nary a hook or anything tangibly close to being memorable. However, there are some nice guitar passages on the record, like the ending, "Epitaph". I thought at first that Prog Extreme Metal fans might be into this but I think this wouldn't work for them either. Requiem Aeternam just are too all over the place, for lack of a better phrase, for most people to possibly get a grasp of. Besides the Classical overtones throughout this record, there isn't very much musical to this. Frantic paced passages that lead to nowhere, with slowed down nuances that beg for more, just leave you challenged to make any sense of this. But the concept of writing 10 songs based around 10 different Classical composers does sound very interesting, just not done by these guys. I'm STILL confused!

Track Listing

1. Track Listing
2. Exordium
3. Destiny-Man
4. Requiem Aeternam
5. Freewill
6. Existence
7. Vying
8. Purposiveness
9. Ser
10. Perseverance
11. Epitaph

Added: March 29th 2011
Reviewer: Butch Jones
Score:
Related Link: Band MySpace page
Hits: 2132
Language: english

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