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Artist: VIRTIGO
Album: Rituals of Broken Flesh
Year: 2008
Virtigo was formed as a one man project in Toronto, Canada (2004), with the idea of mixing industrial metal with black metal. After a bunch of line up changes and the release of the debut album and a limited edition EP, the band (existing out of four members at the moment) released the 'Rituals of Broken Flesh' album. According to the MySpace of this band, 'Rituals of Broken Flesh' "expresses Virtigo’s mix of ideology and eclectic musical tastes. Thrashing guitars meld with synthetic leads torn asunder by screams to the pounding of heavy rhythmic beats."
The release opens, after the instrumental first track, with the dark electro tunes of 'Dysfunctional Visions'. When the guitars and the vocals kick in, the track slowly moves to a midtempo electro metal track. It's mostly electro driven, with wellfitting riffing and black metal vocal lines. 'Forced Choices' comes with quite a catchy melody. It hides influences from synth pop, black metal and dark electro, blended together in a fine package. 'Cult of Fools' is a more atmospheric track, with haunting keylines providing an excellent dark mix with the black metal vocal lines. 'The Spear of Longinus' comes up next. It's one of the better tracks on the release, with excellent electronic sampling, nicely bashing programming and recogniseable vocal lines. The riffing fits excellently in the industrial metal genre, and ends in a surprisingly cool guitar solo. 'Inside The Mind of Thy Torment' consists of EBM influenced programming, mixed with thrashy riffing and atmospheric key intermezzo's. The black metal vocal lines give the track a certain dose of extremity. The next song is based with the lovely title 'Xaphlan Convoys Acrimonia'. It's a marching song, including wellfitting atmospheric keylines, fully bashing programming and wellplaced powerful riffing. 'The Holy Harlot' is an electro driven track, with dark sample works and ditto keylines mixing with wellfitting guitars and simple though effective programming. 'The Architect of Self Destruction' follows. It combines the best dark electro sampling of the whole album with wicked and diverse programming, recogniseable vocal lines and excellent riffing, bringing another highlight forward. 'Suffering For The Sick' once again has a marching attitude. It includes experimental sampling, haunting dark electro influenced keylines and strong recogniseable vocal lines. The album ends with 'The Judge of Christian Derlict'. It's a nice and accessable electro metal track with excellent keylines and riffing, mixed with icy screams and subtile sampling.
'Rituals of Broken Flesh' shows an excellent potential of this band, but as well some lesser point. The programming in most of the tracks sound a bit flat, with exception of a few tracks (4-5-7-9 - who turn out to be the best tracks on the release as well). The keylines are excellent, and sometimes even innovative, but need some better adjustment compared to the sound of the guitars and programming. The band also likes to prominently use spoken samples (from movies, etc.) in their music, which isn't too bad now and then, but my feeling is that they overdid it a little.
Overall, 'Rituals of Broken Flesh' is al album filled with decent compositions, and a few highlights. With a better production and some more practising on the programming, we could see something big happening for Virtigo in the future.
Vote: 75 / 100
Review by: Gerardo
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1. Rituals of Broken Flesh
2. Dysfunctional Visions
3. Forced Choices
4. Cult of Fools
5. The Spear of Longinus
6. Inside The Mind of Thy Torment
7. Xaphlan Convoys Acrimonia
8. The Holy Harlot
9. The Architect of Self Destruction
10. Suffering For The Sick
11. The Judge of Christian Derlict
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