
An Excellent Servant But A Terrible Master
(Selfmadegod Records)
45:00min
Some of the United States’ greatest triumphs in Death Metal originated in New York. Giants such as SUFFOCATION and IMMOLATION both took their first vital steps in New York. The tradition has passed to PYRRHON, who, for the last three years, have studiously gigged with EVOKEN, MISERY INDEX and CANNABIS CORPSE to name a few. Their particular brand of dizzyingly complex Death Metal puts them in a smaller league alongside super-technical bands like GORGUTS, however. Indeed, this is Metal not to be attempted by amateurs. PYRRHON’s album dizzies in the precision of its musicianship, and its arrangements. ‘Glossolalian’, the second track on the album (and try to say it three times fast) for instance, contains so many breaks, so many pulls in different directions, it’s almost like being ripped apart by an arcane musical force. The songs seamlessly flow into one another, making the album a more complete, fluid experience, and lending a sense of symphony as well; as if PYRRHON drew up the songs on a dry-erase board and plotted everything precisely. That might be the case for all we know. The band does some pretty outlandish stuff. Tracks such as ‘Idiot Circles’ and ‘Correcting A Mistake’ pull the listener sideways, then up, then down, and side to side – a roller coaster of fierce Metal. Drawing a line of comparison from PYRRHON to RIPPING CORPSE seems appropriate, but I would add a line to DIM MAK as well, not only because DIM MAK is basically RIPPING CORPSE sans Erik Rutan, but because DIM MAK, like PYRRHON, plays very complicated Death Metal with the same attention to lethality and atmosphere that PYRRHON displays. They are not the same band, by any means, but their aptitudes for tech Death unite them in my view. Just listen to the song ‘A Terrible Master’ and hopefully you too may detect a resemblance in the vocals to Scott Ruth, RIPPING CORPSE’s and once DIM MAK’s idiosyncratic vocalist. A tour with PYRRHON and DIM MAK would be proper and deadly! My only complaint here concerns the duration of the songs, some of which pass the eight minute mark. It’s not impossible to write songs that long, but to write them that length and to keep them interesting nearly is, even for the best. Other than that, a job very well done. With any luck the next PYRRHON album will have yet more vertigo-inducing craziness. www.myspace.com/pyrrhonnyc, http://selfmadegod.com
Nathan Shapiro