52 Albums That Shaped My Life - #40

Sepultura – Arise

(Roadrunner, 1991)

Buy the album here

Scott Burns and Morrisound Recording are responsible for the production of what seems like 50% of classic Floridian death metal.  Just as examples, Death's Leprosy, Obituary's swamp-crawling birth in Slowly We Rot, and the joyous fun of Eaten Back to Life before Cannibal Corpse became too focused on being the band with the biggest circle pits, were all brought to us by this inimitable pairing – their tiny enclave in Tampa was death metal's haven.  However, Burns and Morrisound also worked together in 1990 on the thrash metal outburst of Exhorder's Slaughter In The Vatican, an overlooked album that has always dragged behind it rumours of disagreements over the sound and the hiring of Burns as producer for a sludgy thrash band from New Orleans.  This didn't deter Roadrunner or Sepultura in teaming up with the now notorious producer and his famous recording home.  In 1991 they were responsible for the “big budget” return of Brazil's biggest band, and their intimidating combination of thrash and death metal.  Having also worked on Sepultura's breakout album, Beneath The Remains, in 1988, the stakes were high for band and producer alike.  For Sepultura there is a suggestion that they played it safe by sticking to the style they formed in the making of the previous record, but it's a hollow criticism in the face of such charged, focused, and aggressive music.

Igor and Max Cavalera seem to bring an intensity to the heavy music they make that distils all elements to their purest form.  Andreas Kisser is a great metal guitarist with a unique solo style and keen ear for dynamics and texture, perfectly complementing the top-string-battering, rhythmic barrage of Max, and the elite drumming of Igor.  Hints of the sound that would make them known worldwide on their next two albums popped up in “Altered States”, and there is a certain industrial sound that prefaces Max’s intense side-project Nailbomb, but otherwise this album just tears at you with sharp riffs, non-stop true percussion from Igor, larynx-wrecking vocals, and wild solos.

There’s no better place to start than the title track.  The intro is grim and frightening like the music from some racially insensitive voodoo zombie horror from the 70s, but the explosion of drums and guitars that follows is more demon-summoning than necromancing.  That unforgettable first riff with its angled jabs conjures real malevolence while the drumming is the scrambling of hell-bound souls sent south of heaven by that sharp, heavy snare.  Those souls seem to escape through Max’s layered vocals which climb over one another to deliver their rites.  Max’s growl is a polyp-scraping bark which opts for intensity over range, and demands its listener arise in the political and cultural apocalypse that would come to inform much of Sepultura’s output.  It’s an irresistible call in this three-minute thrash-death attack.  “Dead Embryonic Cells”, however, takes us into groovier Sepultura territory with little glimpses of their breakthrough in to the mainstream on next album, Chaos A.D.  A more textured riffscape gives shape to this medium paced metal groove, with double bass drum-infused injections of speed retaining that thrash feel.  Just after the three minute mark, Kisser pierces the ears with a squealing and electrifying solo which drops us in to a bridge section breakdown with gigantic power chords, heavy drums, and harmonising guitars.  While “Arise” is a neck-jarring attack, “Dead Embryonic Cells” insists that you should let your head move and find that groove.

There are more suggestions of what was to come on Chaos A.D. and Roots in “Altered State” and “Under Seige (Regnum Irae)” with Brazilian tribal drumming and acoustic guitar intros respectively.  What marks them out from later work is the Scott Burns influence: the thick death rhythm guitar; solos riding high in the mix, and a drum sound that seeks to dominate as much as support.  “Altered State” is incredible; easily and ceaselessly transitioning from thrash assault to lead guitar bridge sections to foreboding drum breakdown, it’s a brilliant example of everything that Sepultura can do.  From the moment Kisser lets his solo trail off just after the four minute mark the song becomes an adventure of time changes, riffs, beautiful clean guitar woodles, and inspirational drumming.  It sits right at the heart of this album and most keenly identifies the Sepultura sound.  Alongside the lowdown chug of “Desperate Cry” and the ferocious, heart-pounding “Subtraction” (a fine example of Max’s abilities to add vowels to anything, a la “mass hipponosis”), these songs form the thick and unmoving spine of this record.

The album closes out with the infectious grooves of “Meaningless Movement” and the neck-breaking thrash-death of “Infected Voice”.  The former has some of the most memorable riffs on the album, and one of my favourite Max vocal deliveries on “words I caaaannot uuuuunderstand”, ironically enunciated in such a way that they are the most easily understood words on the album.  The latter harks back to the opening track with blistering riffing and drumming making even “Arise” seem tame.  While it doesn’t have the quality of hook and atmosphere of the title track, it’s a fitting close to an album that melds both ends of the extreme metal decade of the 80s. 

And that’s why this album is here for me.  While I was growing up, the sounds of Metallica and Anthrax were safe enough for me to rebel without ever feeling like I was getting in to dark territory that I didn’t understand.  Sepultura, Scott Burns, Morrisound, and Roadrunner bridged that gap and brought a whole new sub-genre in to my world.  Though I spent a lot of time explaining to people that Roots wasn’t death metal, Sepultura took those influences and opened them up to me and others while forging their unquestionably unique identity.