Ah fuck here we go with Sepultura, the Brazilian metalcore math madmen, shit if these guys didnt change the game forever, so we got Chaos A.D. from 93 and damn if this isnt one of the most important metal albums ever made, this is where they said fuck it to their pure thrash roots and went full groove metal while adding some Brazilian traditional music flavors, and holy shit did it work.
So we kick off with “Refuse/Resist” and what an amazing groovy track this is, it starts with Max’s unborn son’s heartbeat and some Afro-Brazilian drumming that sounds like samba-reggae, then it just crushes you with that groove, its infectious as hell. “Territory” comes next and fuck me this might be my favorite from the album, super heavy tribal madness, Andreas Kisser called it their answer to Metallica’s “Sad but True” and yeah you can hear it, but way fucking heavier. “Slave New World” keeps the momentum going, then we get “Amen” with its perfect simple verse riff, just brutal and catchy.
“Kaiowas” is their first all-acoustic track and Max said it was “like a mixture of Led Zeppelin, Sonic Youth and Olodum”, its weird but it totally works in the context of this album, gives you a breather before they crush your skull again. “Propaganda” starts with haunting guitars before pulverizing your face, while “Biotech Is Godzilla” is pure hardcore punk madness, short and fucking sweet. “Nomad” has those characteristically slow riffs that just drill into your brain, “We Who Are Not as Others” gets progressive with acoustic fills and gang shouts, very effective stuff.
“Manifest” is a brutal tribute to prison violence and shows how political these guys got, while “The Hunt” is a New Model Army cover that they totally make their own. Finally “Clenched Fist” ends the album with another sick grooving verse, perfect way to close things out.
This album is what I call a watershed moment for metal, Sepultura faced the challenge of transitioning from death/thrash while the music scene was exploding with grunge, nobody wanted anything to do with metal at the time, but they pulled it off. This is the album that basically invented groove metal along with Pantera, and its influence is fucking everywhere, Korn were inspired by this when they started, Slipknot members say it was important to them, and Joe Duplantier from Gojira thinks it “gave birth to the whole nu-metal scene”.
The production is grubby yet biting, recorded in Wales of all places, and they used lower tunings for the first time, Max had to fight Andreas over retuning to D standard but it was worth it. The atmosphere is sinister and heavy, feeding off that amazing artwork, this album just oozes dread and aggression but in the most catchy way possible.
This is an amazing album, one of my favorites, and when I think Sepultura started to add more Brazilian traditional music influences its a perfect heavy but groovy album, its groove metal but not like their earlier death/thrash works, its fun and one of the best metal albums of all time, totally essential listening for any metalhead.