In what has already been an unbelievably busy year for technical, brutal death metal, it has been almost impossible to keep up.  With so many bigger releases this year like: Hate Eternal, Morbid Angel, Deicide, Aborted, and Monstrosity ( Just to name a few).  It would be quite easy to miss out a lot of quality smaller label releases, case in point enter Germany’s Deadborn with their third full-length album “Dogma Anti God”.  It has been six years since Deadborn’s last release “Mayhem Maniac Machine”.  Deadborn feature two ex Necrophagist members ( Vocalist – Mario Petrovic and Drummer – Slowak Foltyn).   Deadborn does not sound a lick like Necrophagist but do play a rather catchy and well-polished form of aggressive death metal.

The opening track “Veneration” has the mechanics of a group like Decapitated or Psycroptic in regards to strong focus on groove parts and driving double kick and blast beats.  Petrovic’s vocals at times remind of Sauron on earlier Decapitated records.  This album really grows on you and really quite well produced.  The guitar work is incredibly solid and not overly noodly or relying on technique. Just pummeling, relentless catchiness.   Deadborn also follows traditional death metal song writing structure of tunes ranging from two to four minutes which makes the flow of the album quite consistent.

The title track “Dogma Anti God” is an up-tempo rager that had me doing hairwhips in my car as I heard it for the first time.  Again, I cannot compliment  Slowak Foltyn on his drumwork on this. “Zero Moment of Truth” is a nice acoustic instrumental that has some slight percussive support in the background and provides the listener with a moment to catch their breath from all of the intensity. “Your Symbol Burns” has a complete Vogg from Decapitated vibe to it and is one of the grooviest tracks on the album.  Total Nihility/Negation worship.  I love it.

The second to last track on the album, “Heretic Torment” has my favorite riff on the album.  The opening riff has an abrasive “Raking” sound to it that combined with the drumwork and groove create a pretty unsettling vibe.  Overall,  this is an album towards the end of the year that could have very easily fallen under the radar and I am glad I took a chance on this.  The six year break between albums really gave these guys a chance to put together some top notch, intricate, proficient technical death metal.  Recommended.

[Visit the band's website]

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