The Acacia Strain - Death Is The Only Mortal

One of the best surprise packages that I've heard all year, The Acacia Strain have gone out and made one of the most aggressive and heavy albums of 2012. Love them or hate them, you can't argue with the quality of sheer brutality when listening to 'Death Is The Only Mortal.'

Considered to be a rather boring Deathcore band mostly that mainly features countless amounts of chugging and breakdowns galore, I myself have always had time for this band. Always excited to hear what they bring to the table for each new release, sometimes it's disappointing and sometimes it's very enjoyable. With 'Death Is The Only Mortal' they've taken everything that they are good at and made it as heavy as humanly possible, and it works a treat. A perfect album to listen to when you are in a pissed off mood and want to let off some steam, definitely not something you'd chuck on while you're trying to fall asleep.

You can actually appreciate this album without getting all negative and hating the World, due to how good the production is and just how well the album flows. It's as if they've taken the same formula used from their previous album 'Wormwood' and refined it to a crushingly brutal work of art.

Straight from the start when the first track 'Doomblade' kicks in, you get the feeling that you're in for something heavier than normal. The simple yet ridiculously aggressive and violent lyrics are still here aplenty and very enjoyable and memorable I must say, for example:

"Her entire head was sitting in my freezer, they thought I wanted to eat it, I don't know why, I just wanted to keep it."

Lead vocalist Vincent is as angry as ever on this album and has stepped up his vocal range just a bit more, he really is perfect sounding front man for such a heavy band. You won't find too many releases this year in terms of quality song structure and writing when it comes to this sort of music in particular. Sure it isn't a technical masterpiece, but that's not what TAS do at all, instead they make this sort of music that makes you feel something on a more angry level and they're damn good at it. I think it's the best album TAS have ever written, because most similar bands release music like this and it ends up being boring. But this is far from boring. It's entertaining, angry, heavy and negative but it somehow makes me happy when I put it on because of how good it sounds. There are some incredibly catchy and memorable riffs that will have you banging your head and breaking the speed limit in your car.

So overall what you have here is a band who have always been rather average but after being an active band for over a decade now, they've crafted an album that we will remember them by. I was surprised at how good this album is when I first heard it, and it's definitely going to sit nicely in my Top 10 Albums Of 2012. This is Deathcore with big balls and then some. Go and buy it now!

Standout tracks: Brain Death, The Mouth Of The River and Victims Of The Cave.

8.5/10