Mausoleum - Back From the Funeral

Mausoleum
Back From the Funeral
2011 Razorback Records
The fact is, I've had a copy of this album for months before it was released. By pure chance, a pleasantly buzzed Rick "Slim" Boast [drums, vocals] struck up a conversation with me at the 2011 Maryland Death Fest, and he handed me a promotional copy of this album. I think it's been recorded and done for a while., as I'm fairly sure I saw a review of it sometime in the previous year over at Metal Core Fanzine. I decided to hold off on reviewing it until I had the actual real pressed CD with all the artwork in my hand, because it pisses me off when I read a review of something not officially released, and I know I can't get a copy of it for that reason. I'm sure it pisses off many of you as well. But at long last, eight years after the debut "Cadaveric Displays of Ghoulish Ghastliness," we finally have the followup, "Back From the Funeral." Nothing but old school worship here, complete with all kinds of similarities to the first two Death albums, Massacre, Autopsy, even Unleashed at times.Production-wise, things have a much brighter sound to them, than what was heard on the murky debut. But there's also a"thinness" to it, something that I'm not used to hearing in 2012. Twenty years ago, maybe. It could be that this was intentional on their part, or not. Either way, while not sounding all that "modern," "Back from the Funeral" also doesn't sound like a recently unearthed artifact from the early 1990s either. It lies somewhere between, much like the zombies that are in the lyrics to the songs. Not alive, not dead, instead it is somewhere between the two but belonging to neither. Fortunately,I don't think they're out to eat our brains. But do give them some money out of your wallet and buy this album.