The first international release by Chilean death metal favorites
Undercroft, 2002's
Evilusion is an ultra-professional, mature album which proves just how long this band has been torching vineyards in their native stomping grounds. Rooted in the classic
Sepultura death metal school, with just a pinch of hardcore thrown in for good measure, the album was actually recorded in Sweden, where the air seems most conducive to breeding quality death metal (hence that country's prolific scene). And hey, the plan works famously for tracks four and five: the pulverizing "Celebration of Sin" and the cryptic "The Cartomancer," both of which are quite simply astounding, textbook-perfect death metal songs. Unfortunately, nothing else here can compare to these two winners, and though the band maintains consistently high standards throughout, vicious sonic onslaughts like "Fake Messiah" and "Sub Race" tend to lose themselves in the death metal landscape. Still, this is hardly meant as a diss to what is essentially a very good album by a quality band -- worth checking out. ~ Eduardo Rivadavia