A few years ago I reviewed Embryonic Autopsy’s terrific debut album, Prophecies of the Conjoined, which was the new death metal act by now reformed Oppressor singer and friend Tim King.  Once again joining Tim on Origins of the Deformed is Scott Roberts on guitars and the band bringing in new members, Kenxi on bass and Marco Fimbres on drums.

Once again on Massacre Records Origins of the Deformed sports another striking album cover, just like the debut and with the same run time of 31 minutes with 10 songs, the band wastes little to no time in punishing us all with “Dripping in the Vaginal Nectar”.  The atmospheric intro starts things off right until the loud AF drums kick in with the blast beat, and the growl Tim lets loose is perfect 90’s flair brutal American death metal.  He nails that growl to a T.  Embryonic Autopsy are not going to reinvent the death metal wheel here, as they want nothing else than to body slam your pathetic body into oblivion.  Some cool guitar soloing happening around the 2.20 mark and Tim grunting forth with vomitrocious vocals.  So killer.  The drums become overbearing as the mix has these suckers wayyyy too loud for the album’s duration.

“Orgies of the Inseminated” opens with a creative beginning and the gallop with Tim laying out a killer growl, then right into that slower section, will have pits creating sinkholes all damn day.  Mark my words.  This gallop section is my favorite moment on the album and this is the best song on the album, imo.  I will digress a moment because I did contact Tim about this drum sound.  It sounds so clinical that it has a drum machine sound to it.  Tim assured me Marco laid down live drums for this and Tim also knows I felt the drum sound is too overbearing on this album.  At times it will drown everything out, and as I mentioned, it sounds like a drum machine – no warmth or organic nature to the drums.  This song is monstrously heavy and when the band keeps to this scaled-back approach….I swear this gallop….so damn heavy.

“Spewed Forth Into Chunks” is the perfect title for the mid-west death metal sound the band is part of.  Once the blast beat hits it will throttle you and tear your head off and play dodgeball with it.  Again, the snare drum sound takes center stage and unfortunately drowns out some of that heavy guitar sound.  From start to finish, this song is a speed freak’s wet dream.  “Carnivorous Abortion” is another track with that galloping type of pace, allowing those heavy riffs to cut through much more.  These moments have so much power and heaviness to them – more of these moments fellas.  There are some impeccable guitar solos on this as well.

Origins of the Deformed is a decent follow-up to their killer debut.  I would have liked to have had the drum production scaled back more and brought in more of an organic, less clinical sound to it.  More of those galloping moments, with fewer blasts, appear to sound better for Embryonic Autopsy. Sometimes a less is more approach works better in terms of sounding more brutal.  Some high praise is for the guitars, when they get a chance to shine, sound vicious.  Another standout is Tim’s vocal style.  He sounds so filthy and disgusting – I love his vocals on this!!!!  At the end of the day if you enjoyed the debut I still feel you will enjoy this follow-up.

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